There is the desire of the Holy Spirit to bring the praise of the people of God to a higher place. This is about worship in the Spirit and in truth (see John 4:23-24).

 

23 Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks.

24 God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.”

To worship in truth means to worship the Father through Jesus Christ.

To worship in the Spirit means to worship in the new kingdom that God has revealed to mankind.

The New Kingdom And The Melody in the Words

In order to understand that concept of the new kingdom, I would like to use these two definitions:

Kingdom of God:
A) It is the dominion of God within the believer by the way of the Holy Spirit. B) It is the presence of God that dwells in a person as his holy habitation.

This presence releases the embodiment/structure of God in relation to the person, which includes all the benefits, provisions and power characteristics of the Creator and His eternal kingdom.
This embodiment/structure releases the hand of God to move and exercise his authority wherever there is a a believer present. (partial excerpt from the “Prophet's Dictionary” by Paula A. Price, Ph. D.; page 298)

Kingdom of Heaven:
A) It is the dominion and influence of God's orders, systems, rules and ways in the affairs of men. B) The influence of the church of Jesus Christ in the world.
C) It is what the authority of Jesus Christ as the ruler of the kingdom of God and His heavens imposes on the world. (partial excerpt from the “Prophet's Dictionary” by Paula A. Price, Ph. D.; page 298)

It is the Holy Spirit bringing the melody of heaven into our words, which leads to an uplifting of words. When we raise our voice in truthfulness to God in worship, we begin to see God's intentions and plans prophetically in a new way.

 

The people of Israel, for example, had entered the process of transforming sound by leaving Egypt at the right time. They left the realm of slavery.

 

By leaving Egypt, Israel transformed its sound of crying out for help that it aroused out of Egypt into the sound of praise in the desert (see Exodus 3:9.18).

 

9 And now the cry of the Israelites has reached me, and I have seen the way the Egyptians are oppressing them. …

18 “The elders of Israel will listen to you. Then you and the elders are to go to the king of Egypt and say to him, ‘The Lord, the God of the Hebrews, has met with us. Let us take a three-day journey into the wilderness to offer sacrifices to the Lord our God.’

Judah and Tamar

To emphasize the importance of maintaining worship at this time, let us be reminded of the story of Judah and Tamar (see Genesis 38).
 

Tamar (note: means “palm tree, date palm”) was the daughter-in-law of Judah (note: means

“worship, praise”). She knew how to enter a life as a mother from the life of a widow, because she honored the bloodline of her father-in-law Judah: in short, Tamar honored the life of worship!

Therein, she has become a “tree” that worshiped God (see Psalm 96:12-13a)!

 

12 Let the fields be jubilant, and everything in them; let all the trees of the forest sing for joy.

13a Let all creation rejoice before the Lord, …

This kind of worship had opened her womb to receive twins, Perez and Zerah (note: “Perez” means “a break, breach, breaking forth” and “Zerah” means “a rising of light or red glow of the rising sun”).

Tamar received her breakthrough pointing to the merciful hand of God, which is the shining blood of the true lion of Judah – Jesus Christ (see Genesis 38:14-18.27-30 i.c.w. Revelation 5:5).

 

14 she took off her widow’s clothes, covered herself with a veil to disguise herself, and then sat down at the entrance to Enaim, which is on the road to Timnah. For she saw that, though Shelah had now grown up, she had not been given to him as his wife.

15 When Judah saw her, he thought she was a prostitute, for she had covered her face.

16 Not realizing that she was his daughter-in-law, he went over to her by the roadside and said, “Come now, let me sleep with you.” “And what will you give me to sleep with you?” she asked.

17 “I’ll send you a young goat from my flock,” he said. “Will you give me something as a pledge until you send it?” she asked.

18 He said, “What pledge should I give you?” “Your seal and its cord, and the staff in your hand,” she answered. So he gave them to her and slept with her, and she became pregnant by him. …

27 When the time came for her to give birth, there were twin boys in her womb.

28 As she was giving birth, one of them put out his hand; so the midwife took a scarlet thread and tied it on his wrist and said, “This one came out first.”

29 But when he drew back his hand, his brother came out, and she said, “So this is how you have broken out!” And he was named Perez.

30 Then his brother, who had the scarlet thread on his wrist, came out. And he was named Zerah.

 

Revelation 5:5:
5 Then one of the elders said to me, “Do not weep! See, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, has triumphed. He is able to open the scroll and its seven seals.”

The Daughter of Jephthah

In connection with the story of Tamar, who saved the bloodline of the “HIGH Praise” – JUDAH, I would like to continue to go into the story of Jephthah, who was a judge in Israel at his time.
Jephthah was the son of a harlot, who had been rejected and despised by his half-brothers. He was a good warrior and fought victoriously against the Ammonites (means “inbred, independent” from Strong's H5983).

Jephthah had only one child, a daughter who became part of an oath which he made to God during the time of the war when he faced the Ammonites (see Judges 11:1-2.29-32.34-37).

 

1 Jephthah the Gileadite was a mighty warrior. His father was Gilead; his mother was a prostitute.

2 Gilead’s wife also bore him sons, and when they were grown up, they drove Jephthah away. “You are not going to get any inheritance in our family,” they said, “because you are the son of another woman.” …

29 Then the Spirit of the Lord came on Jephthah. He crossed Gilead and Manasseh, passed through Mizpah of Gilead, and from there he advanced against the Ammonites.

30 And Jephthah made a vow to the Lord: “If you give the Ammonites into my hands,

31 whatever comes out of the door of my house to meet me when I return in triumph from the Ammonites will be the Lord’s, and I will sacrifice it as a burnt offering.”

32 Then Jephthah went over to fight the Ammonites, and the Lord gave them into his hands. …

34 When Jephthah returned to his home in Mizpah, who should come out to meet him but his daughter, dancing to the sound of timbrels! She was an only child. Except for her he had neither son nor daughter.

35 When he saw her, he tore his clothes and cried, “Oh no, my daughter! You have brought me down and I am devastated. I have made a vow to the Lord that I cannot break.”

36 “My father,” she replied, “you have given your word to the Lord. Do to me just as you promised, now that the Lord has avenged you of your enemies, the Ammonites.

37 But grant me this one request,” she said. “Give me two months to roam the hills and weep with my friends, because I will never marry.”

 

 

Because of Jephthah's oath, as reflected in Judges 11:30-31, his only daughter went to the high places and was conscious about the fact that she was a living sacrifice.

 

She was completely in agreement with her father, just as Jesus Christ was when He went to the cross of Golgotha. This attitude is also found to this day in those who consider themselves a part of the Bride of Jesus and express their love to God through obedience to Jesus and the Father (see Judges 11:36-37 i.c.w. Matthew 26:39; Romans 12:1; 1 Peter 2:5; Ephesians 5:25-27).

 

36 “My father,” she replied, “you have given your word to the Lord. Do to me just as you promised, now that the Lord has avenged you of your enemies, the Ammonites.

37 But grant me this one request,” she said. “Give me two months to roam the hills and weep with my friends, because I will never marry.”

 

39 Going a little farther, he fell with his face to the ground and prayed, “My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will.”

 

1 Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship.

 

… 5 you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.

 

25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her

26 to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word,

27 and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless.

 

 

The people of Israel and its strangers were normally not allowed to sacrifice any human being (see Leviticus 18:21; Leviticus 20:2-5; Deuteronomy 12:31; Deuteronomy 18:10).

 

21 “ ‘Do not give any of your children to be sacrificed to Molek, for you must not profane the name of your God. I am the Lord.

 

2 “Say to the Israelites: ‘Any Israelite or any foreigner residing in Israel who sacrifices any of his children to Molek is to be put to death. The members of the community are to stone him.

3 I myself will set my face against him and will cut him off from his people; for by sacrificing his children to Molek, he has defiled my sanctuary and profaned my holy name.

4 If the members of the community close their eyes when that man sacrifices one of his children to Molek and if they fail to put him to death,

5 I myself will set my face against him and his family and will cut them off from their people together with all who follow him in prostituting themselves to Molek.

 

31 You must not worship the Lord your God in their way, because in worshiping their gods, they do all kinds of detestable things the Lord hates. They even burn their sons and daughters in the fire as sacrifices to their gods.

 

10 Let no one be found among you who sacrifices their son or daughter in the fire, who practices divination or sorcery, interprets omens, engages in witchcraft, …

 

However, when an Israelite made an oath affecting a person over whom he had responsibility, the Israelite had to redeem that person with silver before God (see Leviticus 27:1-8 i.c.w. Psalm 12:6; John 1:3-4.14).

 

1 The Lord said to Moses, 2 “Speak to the Israelites and say to them: ‘If anyone makes a special vow to dedicate a person to the Lord by giving the equivalent value, 3 set the value of a male between the ages of twenty and sixty at fifty shekels of silver, according to the sanctuary shekel; 4 for a female, set her value at thirty shekels; 5 for a person between the ages of five and twenty, set the value of a male at twenty shekels and of a female at ten shekels; 6 for a person between one month and five years, set the value of a male at five shekels6 of silver and that of a female at three shekels of silver; 7 for a person sixty years old or more, set the value of a male at fifteen shekels8 and of a female at ten shekels.

8 If anyone making the vow is too poor to pay the specified amount, the person being dedicated is to be presented to the priest, who will set the value according to what the one making the vow can afford.

 

6 And the words of the Lord are flawless, like silver purified in a crucible, like gold refined seven times.

 

3 Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made.

4 In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. …

14 The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.

 

The Numbers “2”, “10” and “30”

 

The number “2” has a certain significance in the story of Jephthah's daughter. Therefore, it is worth taking a closer look at this number. The daughter of Jephthah was in the mountains for two months and the number “2” is connected to the creation of the firmament – the heaven by God (see Genesis 1:6-8).

 

6 And God said, “Let there be a vault between the waters to separate water from water.”

7 So God made the vault and separated the water under the vault from the water above it. And it was so.

8 God called the vault “sky.” And there was evening, and there was morning – the second day.

 

It is helpful to fully understand the speaking of God through this prophetic teaching in this story, it is worth also taking a closer look at the number “10” and the number “30”. It is not written in the book of Judges how old Jephthah's daughter was, but it is possible that she was between 15 and 20 years old, because she went to the mountains by herself with her friends weeping for her youth.

 

Therefore, it is interesting to note what “value” a woman at this age had to be given according to the Word of God when she was put under an oath. According to Leviticus 27:3-4, the value for a woman at this age was 10 shekels or 30 shekels.

 

The number “10” is among other things connected with the “peaks of the mountains” and the number “30” is connected with the beginning of Jesus Christ's ministry in public but also with the height of the ark of Noah (see Genesis 8:5; Luke 3:23 i.c.w. Genesis 6:15).

 

5 The waters continued to recede until the tenth month, and on the first day of the tenth month the tops of the mountains became visible.

 

23 Now Jesus himself was about thirty years old when he began his ministry. He was the son, so it was thought, of Joseph, the son of Heli, …

 

15 This is how you are to build it: The ark is to be three hundred cubits long, fifty cubits wide and thirty cubits high.

 

 

With this message according to the story of Jephthah's daughter, the Lord is calling us into a higher sphere of worship that is linked with self-abandonment. Through the sacrifice of self-abandonment we are permitted to enter a higher realm of worship including apostolic worship (see Galatians 2:20).

 

20 I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

 

 

=> As the gift of an Apostle and the calling of an Apostle represents the government of God, apostolic worship is worship that facilitates the government of God as He enthrones Himself on our praises.

 

Apostolic worship brings us into the Lord's governmental sphere and its progress on the earth. “Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” (see Matthew 6:10)

 

Apostolic worship implies that the worshipers only lend themselves to the purposes of God in their worship. It includes the coming to the place where the bridegroom invites the bride entering His kingdom. This is where the bridegroom enters into His apostolic function as He calls back to us, “Come away, my beloved!” (see Song of Songs 2:10.13)

 

We are in need to come to an understanding of how we must facilitate and support His apostolic functioning in our worship. We can no longer allow our worship to be limited by mere traditions, our culture of worship or our personal preferences.

 

It is time to move past these limitations and former traditions by getting more into an apostolic understanding of worship. The purpose of apostolic worship is not to take the place of our passionate heartfelt worship, nor do we allow our intimate worship in the bridegroom's chamber to be diminished, but we must discover how to take that zeal in worship into His governmental perspective instead.

 

It is apostolic worship that brings all of our aspects of worship into their maximum expression by honoring God as the only King of kings (see Revelation 19:16). <= (This section set in "=>" is based on a teaching on apostolic worship from the book "Worship As It Is In Heaven"; ISBN-13: 978-0-8307-5543-1; Regal books by John Dickson and Chuck D. Pierce.)

 

16 On his robe and on his thigh he has this name written: king of kings and lord of lords.

 

 

We have to get up from our present status of worship and roll it as a scroll (note: ending), similar to the healed paralyzed man in the time of Peter while he was in Lydda. This paralyzed man rolled up his mat and got up (note: putting his former lifestyle behind). Like this, we should also take up our status of worship in order to come to our place of apostolic government in worship as His church (see Acts 9:32-35).

 

32 As Peter traveled about the country, he went to visit the Lord’s people who lived in Lydda.

33 There he found a man named Aeneas (means “laudable, the one who is honored”), who was paralyzed and had been bedridden for eight years.

34 “Aeneas,” Peter said to him, “Jesus Christ heals you. Get up and roll up your mat.” Immediately Aeneas got up.

35 All those who lived in Lydda (means “big village, strife, quarrel”) and Sharon saw him and turned to the Lord.

If we roll up our worship and bring it to a higher standard as apostolic worship, a new sphere will be created in the supernatural realm. This worship is connected to a new sound and a new season of spiritual maturity.

 

Its focus is no longer being blessed by God or thanking Him for His grace as His children, but rather of adoring, admiring and honoring God as the Almighty One, the Father being the eternal and righteous King and Judge of all by living our identity as mature sons knowing our Father's sphere of government.

 

The realm of God where the apostolic anointing has its seat is linked with His high thoughts in order to help us recognize our “now place” in Him and to give us confidence for the future. Whenever we operate in that apostolic presence of God, our assignment is to descend into our environment with the apostolic presence of the Lord to reveal God's governmental authority.

 

 

This process is like the transformation within the leading force of the movement of the throne of God, where there is a change from the face of man to the face of the lion (see Ezekiel 1:12).

 

12 Each one went straight ahead. Wherever the spirit would go, they would go, without turning as they went.

 

According to the book of Revelation, the face of the lion of the four living beings before the throne of God is placed in the first position and the face of the man in the third (see Revelation 4:7).

 

7 The first living creature was like a lion, the second was like an ox, the third had a face like a man, the fourth was like a flying eagle.

 

This mentioned transformation describes the change into the apostolic movement, because the lion is the king of terrestrial animals representing also the ministry of the apostle.

 

Furthermore, it is the apostle who is called as the first officer of the five-fold ministry within the body of Christ (see 1 Corinthians 12:28a; Ephesians 2:20; Ephesians 4:11)

 

28 And God has placed (note: Greek “tithēmi” => “to appoint, to ordain, to commit, to give”; Strong's G5087) in the church first of all apostles, …

 

… 20 built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone.

 

11 So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, …

 

However God decides to go forward in the spirit realm, the respective face of the four living beings of God is in the leading position and reveals the particular power (note: anointing) of God that manifests on earth.

 

 

Moses also reflected the presence of God by one attribute of the four living beings of God.

It was the one of the bull, because as he descended from mount Sinai with the presence of God to the people of Israel, it is said that the glory of God emanated from the face of Moses in form of horns (see Exodus 34:29-30).

 

29 When Moses came down from Mount Sinai with the two tablets of the covenant law in his hands, he was not aware that his face was radiant because he had spoken with the Lord.

30 When Aaron and all the Israelites saw Moses, his face was radiant, and they were afraid to come near him.

 

The Hebrew word which is used in Exodus 34:30 for “shining/radiant” is “qâran” and comes from the root word “qeren” that means “horns”.

 

It is God's demand and the desire of the Holy Spirit that we also descend with His presence on our faces in order to reveal and reflect His leading spiritual characteristic for this time.

 

His presence on our face is assigned to reveal His love and His government to the people within our fields of responsibility (see 2 Corinthians 3:7-11).

 

7 Now if the ministry that brought death, which was engraved in letters on stone, came with glory, so that the Israelites could not look steadily at the face of Moses because of its glory, transitory though it was, 8 will not the ministry of the Spirit be even more glorious?

9 If the ministry that brought condemnation was glorious, how much more glorious is the ministry that brings righteousness!

10 For what was glorious has no glory now in comparison with the surpassing glory.

11 And if what was transitory came with glory, how much greater is the glory of that which lasts!

 

In order to gain a deeper understanding of the current transformation in the church, the following messages related to higher worship and God's divine order for the church should be referred here:

 

 

In His Wisdom,

 

Daniel Glimm