Joan Boney ... apostle/prophet
After Jesus arose, after the crucifixion and resurrection ... Jesus gave to the church the ministry offices of apostle, prophet, evangelist, pastor and teacher. Ephesians 4:11
The NT apostle, is given an anointing by God which equips him to deal with scripture ... keeping doctrine straight in the church.
Paul spoke a doctrine that greatly upset the Jews in his day.
Paul said the Gentiles who believed in God did not have to be circumcised!
Certainly this sounded to the Jews like heresy for God gave Abraham circumcision as a sign of the covenant made between God and the nation of Israel.
Now Paul is telling them they are not saved by circumcision but by faith in the work of God through Jesus, a new covenant.
In several epistles to the church in the New Testament, Paul spoke of this.
This is a large part of the work of those who are called as apostles ... to deal with doctrine, comparing scripture with scripture.
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As a young child, when we visited my aunt, I would often go to church with her.
During the service they would pass a tray with broken bits of crackers ... and then pass a tray with grape juice cups ... They called this "The Lord's Supper."
They told me I couldn't partake of this until I became a member of the church.
I would watch my aunt and she very solemnly took a bit of one of the crackers and very solemnly ate the bit of cracker... then she took one of the cups and drank the grape juice in a very solemnly way.
Later, I went forward and was baptized in water because I didn't want to go to hell and I thought this is the way you kept from going to hell.
(I was not born again. I just didn't want to go to hell.)
(I was not born again. I just didn't want to go to hell.)
I was about 15-years-old the first time I was baptized in water. (Later, when I was 37-years-old, God spoke to me by HIS Spirit causing me to be born again.)
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A few things greatly troubled me:
In I Corinthians 11, it says ...
27 Wherefore whosoever shall eat this bread, and drink this cup of the Lord, unworthily, shall be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord.
27 Wherefore whosoever shall eat this bread, and drink this cup of the Lord, unworthily, shall be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord.
29 For he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh damnation to himself, not discerning the Lord's body.
30 For this cause many are weak and sickly among you, and many sleep.
31 For if we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged.
Even before I was born again, I had great concern over this, for how was I supposed to judge myself? And how was I to know if I was eating and drinking in a "worthy" way? And how was I supposed to "examine myself?"
Years later, after I was born again, God showed me the Lord supper was not eating crackers and grape juice at the church service.
The Lord's supper was the eating and drinking of the Word of God. The entire church service was the Lord's supper when the doctrine presented to the church was correct doctrine.
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You "judge yourself" by that which the scripture says.
You eat and drink the scriptures "worthily" by applying the Word of God in a correct way to your own life, conforming yourself to the scripture by doing what the scripture says.
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All of I Corinthians 11 , which pertains to the Lord's supper, has to do with the eating and drinking of the Word of God.
I Corinthians 11:23-25 For I have received of the Lord that which also I delivered unto you, That the Lord Jesus the same night in which HE was betrayed took bread: And when HE had given thanks, HE brake it, and said, Take, eat: this is MY body, which is broken for you: this do in remembrance of ME.
After the same manner also HE took the cup, when HE had supped, saying, This cup is the new testament in My blood: this do ye, as oft as ye drink it, in remembrance of Me.
The churches took this as being the eating of fleshly crackers (substitute for bread) and grape juice (substitute for wine).
We see they were performing a work of their own mind in a fleshly way by setting up crackers and grape juice. They didn't even do what Jesus said. If Jesus said bread, as natural bread, then it should not be crackers.
These churches that profess the Lord's supper is partaking of crackers and grape juice don't even follow the scripture which they profess to believe ... if they did they would have to partake of "bread" and "wine".
But Jesus was speaking of the Word of God and eating and drinking the Word of God as the Lord's supper.
These churches viewed this in a fleshly way by their own understanding.
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But what Jesus was really showing is the following.
John 6:35 And Jesus said unto them,
I (THE WORD) am the bread of life: he that cometh to ME (the Word) shall never hunger; and he that believeth on ME (the Word) shall never thirst.
John 6:51-54 I am the living bread which came down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever: and the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.
(THE WORD, JESUS, is the living bread ... We eat "of this bread", the Word ... )
The Jews therefore strove among themselves, saying, How can this man give us His flesh to eat?
Then Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink His blood, ye have no life in you.
Whoso eateth My flesh, and drinketh My blood, hath eternal life; and I will raise him up at the last day.
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All of this pertains to the eating and drinking of the Word of God.
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When we view the eating and drinking of the Word of God as the Lord's supper, then the following scriptures in I Corinthians 11 make sense:
I Corinthians 11:26-30 For as often as ye eat this bread (The Word of God), and drink this cup (The New Testament in HIS blood ... The Word of God), ye do shew the Lord's death till He come.
Wherefore whosoever shall eat this bread (the Word), and drink this cup (the Word) of the Lord, unworthily, shall be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord.
But let a man examine himself (by that which the Word says), and so let him eat of that bread (the Word), and drink of that cup (the Word).
(As we read the New Testament, we examine ourselves by The Word ... making changes as needed by The Word ... and so let us eat that bread, The Scriptures, looking for needed changes in our life ... and so let us drink of that cup (The Word), examining ourselves by The Word.)
For he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh damnation to himself, not discerning the Lord's body.
(He that reads the Bible in an "unworthy" way, failing to make changes to his own life in spiritual ways, fails to discern the Lord's body which is The Word, making the sacrifice of Jesus by HIS broken body and shed blood of no effect in the man who partakes incorrectly of the scriptures.)
For this cause many are weak and sickly among you, and many sleep (die).
(Often people who identify themselves as Christians are in such bad physical and mental conditions ... and usually it is because they failed to partake of the Bible correctly, applying scriptures to their own lives in spiritual ways. Often they have years of failing to do the scripture they are reading. Scripture upon scripture is read and discarded. Therefore sin upon sin continues in those who eat the scripture in an unworthy manner.)
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I Corinthians 11:31-32 For if we would judge ourselves (by the word of God), we should not be judged.
(If we do the scriptures in spiritual ways we are going to correct ourselves.)
But when we are judged (by God), we are chastened of the Lord, that we should not be condemned with the world.
A teacher at a church I once attended was committing fornication at the time he was teaching our Bible class at that church.
A few years later, he told me fornication was no longer a problem to him. He said "Age took care of that." I think he was saying he was now impotent.
I would view that as a "chastening of the Lord" that he would not be condemned with the fornicators of this world.
I certainly hope that is the case in his life, and I would hope he came to recognize his sin because of the destruction of his flesh which he brought upon himself by his sin.
Concerning a fornicator in the church, Paul said:
I Corinthians 5:3-5 For I verily, as absent in body, but present in spirit, have judged already, as though I were present, concerning him that hath so done this deed,
In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, when ye are gathered together, and my spirit, with the power of our Lord Jesus Christ, To deliver such an one unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.
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Concerning the eating of the flesh of Jesus and drinking of the blood of Jesus, Jesus said:
John 6:55-58 For MY flesh is meat indeed, and MY blood is drink indeed.
(The scripture is real meat ... the blood of Jesus is real power.)
He that eateth MY flesh, and drinketh MY blood, dwelleth in ME, and I in him.
As the living Father hath sent ME, and I live by the Father: so he that eateth ME, even he shall live by ME.
(You cannot live by Jesus, the Word, unless you eat and drink the scriptures correctly.)
This is that bread which came down from heaven: not as your fathers did eat manna, and are dead: he that eateth of this bread shall live for ever.
(For the Word of the Lord endures forever.) I Peter 1:25
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John 6:59-63 These things said HE in the synagogue, as HE taught in Capernaum.
Many therefore of His disciples, when they had heard this, said, This is an hard saying; who can hear it?
(At that time the disciples, who did not yet have the Holy Spirit, saw this by their own fleshly understanding and saw what Jesus said through natural eyes and thought Jesus was speaking of eating HIS real flesh and drinking HIS bodily blood... but Jesus was showing the eating and drinking of the Word of God.)
John 6:61-63 When Jesus knew in HIMSELF that HIS disciples murmured at it, HE said unto them, Doth this offend you?
What and if ye shall see the Son of man ascend up where HE was before?
It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life.
(The Word spoken to us by the Spirit of Jesus, the Holy Spirit, is spirit and life. The Word is the supper given by the Lord.)
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If you are eating crackers and drinking grape juice at a church group, this will profit you nothing, for all this is fleshly viewing of the scripture by man who set up crackers and grape juice and called it "The Lord's Supper".
Viewing the eating and drinking as partaking of the word of God is spiritual and has great power of God when we eat and drink the scriptures correctly, doing the scriptures.
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In essence, the entire church service where scripture is presented and doctrine is presented is the Lord's supper, when the doctrine is correctly presented at the church service.
(As you read this blog, it will avail you nothing unless you eat correctly, applying the scriptures and the instructions to your own life ... In fact if you eat the instructions on this blog in an "unworthy" manner, failing to apply these instructions to your life, you eat this blog to your own destruction.)
If the doctrine presented at the church service is incorrect, then that service is not the Lord's supper. That church group is the end-time apostasy from which we flee.
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Also we read ...
I Corinthians 11:33 Wherefore, my brethren, when ye come together to eat, tarry one for another.
This means not all have heard the doctrine of Christ. Therefore we speak that doctrine. Those who already know the doctrine "tarry one for another" as those new to the doctrine learn the doctrine.
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If you are attending a church today where they have cast aside portions of the scriptures and you know this is wrong but you remain there to partake of crackers/grape juice thinking it is "The Lord's Supper," you need to reexamine this doctrine for crackers/grape juice is not the Lord's supper.
Crackers/grape juice have no power.
Neither are you better if you eat ... nor are you worse if you do not eat.
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