DEWITT
TABERNACLE TEACHING SERIES
SOLDIERS
OF THE CROSS
OF
JESUS
CHRIST
By
C.W.Wood
June 2007
There is being a mighty army raised up on the earth and its
commanding general is Jesus Christ of Nazareth. Although this army is living in
flesh bodies, they do not make war after the fleshly way of fighting. II Cor.
10:3-4, “For though they walk in
flesh they do not war after the flesh. The weapons of their warfare are not
carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds.” This
army has been Born-Again into the
This army is called in the scripture, “Kings and priests unto God and shall reign on the earth.” (Rev.
5:10) They have been given the Keys to the Kingdom (Matt.
They are dressed in uniforms fashioned on the looms of Heaven; robes
that are so dazzling white that the host of Hell tremble and shake at their very
appearance! We speak of “The Robe of
Righteousness”, which is “The
gift of righteousness” as seen in Rom. 5:17, “For if by one man’s offence death reigned by one (Adam),
much more they which receive abundance of grace, and of “The Gift of
Righteousness” shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ.”
According to Scripture, these individuals are reckoned by God to be
as righteous as He, Himself! What a statement this is, and no man would dare to
say such a thing that is unless he had God’s own Word for it! Even then, we
tremble as we quote Him! II Cor. 5:21, “For
He hath made Him to be sin for us, who knew no sin (God has made Jesus to be
sin for us and Jesus knew no sin), that
we might be made the righteousness of God in Him.”
Can we comprehend such a thing? Can we find it in our heart to accept
such a powerful, soul-saving gift? Do
we dare to buckle on this “Breastplate
of Righteousness?” (Eph. 6:14)
The natural mind is so concerned with the failures of the flesh-man that
it cannot receive such an impossible sounding promise! Therefore, God has
declared that we must be “transformed (changed)
by the renewing of our mind.” (
The Army of which I speak has been brought through these three steps, and
by them they have a renewed mind, so that they have taken hold of God’s
free “Gift of Righteousness” and there is “Therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ
Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.” (Rom. 8:1)
They are of the group mentioned in the scriptures as having been “made
accepted in the Beloved.” (Eph. 1:6) They are “Holy
and without blame before Him in love.” (Eph. 1:4) They are blessed beyond
man’s ability to understand it or describe it because the
Lord will not charge sin unto them. Rom. 4:8, “Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not charge sin.” Rom.
8:33, “Who shall lay anything to the charge of God’s Elect? It is
God that justifieth! Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died…..
(To pay our sin-debt in full past,
present and future.)
Being justified by faith, we have peace with God. (Rom. 5:1). This peace
amounts to “No condemnation.”
(Rom. 8:1) Memory looks back at past sins, and conscience is aware of present
sins (though we strive against them, we still have them).
We are filled with sorrow because of our failures, but praises rise from
our hearts at the same time for we know by His Holy Word that our sins are not
being charged against us!
There is only one way to ever know this and that is by faith. Our
emotions will deny it and so will our walk seem to disprove it, but the word of
God is unchangeable and He has declared it so, therefore it is forever true.
We walk every moment with repentant hearts and are washed moment by
moment as we have need! “Who shall lay anything to God’s Elect Army?” Not
God, for He has justified us! Not Christ, for He has died in our place and is
risen again! My faith lives not because I am not a sinner, but rather because I
am a sinner for whom Jesus died. My trust is not that I am holy in my flesh, but
being unholy, He became my Righteousness! We do not trust in what we are in our
flesh, nor in what we ever shall be in this flesh, nor in what we feel, but in
what Jesus Christ is! It is one of the first revelations that we receive, that
our God is just and cannot be otherwise! We know it is so, and we hold to it.
Therefore, He will not demand double payment for a debt that is already paid.
God must change His nature before He could do so, but He changes not (Mal. 3:6).
Our duty, as members of God’s End-time Army, is to confess that we are “nothing else but sin” for no confession short of this is the
whole truth. If the Holy Spirit is in us, convicting us of sin, we will have no
problem confessing the same. It will come spontaneously from our lips! But what
comfort there is in the scriptures for we who are under a deep sense of sin. Sin
that is hated and confessed will never shut us away from our God. “Whosoever
comes to Him, He will in no wise cast out.” (John 6:37)
Though as dishonest as the thief, though as unchaste as the woman caught in
adultery, though as wrong as Saul of Tarsus, though as rebellious as the
Prodigal Son, and as unfaithful as Peter who denied Him, the Great Heart of God
will look on the truly repentant and call him clean when he trusts in Jesus
crucified.
God’s great army (I use the word “great” not numerically, but in
the sense of spiritual power) is now climbing over the great barrier that stands
between them and no condemnation. In
times past, our hopes have been fastened to our emotions. When we felt so high,
so Heavenly-minded, so close to our God, so caught up above earthly things, then
we thought ourselves to be accepted by God. But on days when our souls were cast
into the dust, we had some very real doubts that we were still accepted! We must
see that all our good feelings do not exalt us in God’s eyes, and that all our
times of spiritual dryness do not take away from our standing before Him. The
unchanging God looks to see if we still embrace His Cross! Is our faith anchored
to the fact of His Perfect Life and His following Perfect Sacrifice? He accepts
us as we cling to His Righteousness that He has mercifully credited to our
account. This “clinging” is simply to read His promises and believe what He
said. To be sure, our sins trouble us, but He has cast them behind Him. We look
at ourselves and conclude, “There is nothing acceptable here!” but look away
unto Jesus and see if everything is not acceptable there! We do have to fight
with corruption in our flesh. We do wrestle with temptations, but we are already
“accepted in the Beloved.” (Eph.
1:6)
An old song comes to mind, as I think of the Army God has raised up, one
I sang in Sunday School as a small boy. It is called:
ONWARD
CHRISTIAN SOLDIERS
Onward, Christian soldiers,
Marching as to war.
With the cross of Jesus
Going on before!
Christ, the royal Master (General),
Leads against the foe;
Forward into battle,
See His banner go!
At the sign of triumph
Satan's host does flee;
On, then, Christian soldiers,
On to victory!
Hell's foundations quiver
At the shout of praise;
Brothers, lift your voices,
Loud your anthems raise!
Like a mighty army
Moves the church (Bride) of God;
Brothers, we are treading
Where the saints have trod;
We are not divided;
All one body we,
One in hope and doctrine,
One in charity.
Onward, then ye people (Bride),
Join our happy throng,
Blend with ours your voices
In the triumph song;
Glory, laud, and honor,
Unto Christ the King:
This thro' countless ages
Men and angels sing.
Psalms 138:5 declares, “They
shall sing in the ways of the Lord!” How this writer remembers the night I
first began to sing in the ways of the Lord. I had just lost my terrible burden
of sin. It was laid at the foot of the Cross.
Do you, dear reader, remember when your fetters fell off? Do you remember
the place and the time when Jesus met you and said, “I
have loved you with an everlasting love,
I have blotted out as a cloud your transgressions, and as a thick cloud thy
sins; they shall not be mentioned against thee anymore forever.” (Isa.
44:22) John Bunyan describes it by saying, “When poor Pilgrim lost his burden
at the Cross, he gave three great leaps, and went on his way singing!”
But it is not only at the start of our Christian life that we have reason
for song. Now, as the days of God’s Grace are turning toward judgment, and we
realize that our warfare is coming to an end, we are quickened into a place of
expectancy that we have never before experienced! Our gaze is directed toward
the Eastern Sky, and our ears are listening intently for the sound of a Voice
calling, “Come up hither.” Church Natural, the church without the oil,
cannot understand how we can rejoice that all our sins are gone because of
Jesus! Their works and prayers, ceremonies and programs give them very little
faith and comfort, and they should be uneasy as they look to things other than
the Blood of Christ. We must all sit down and behold the Justice of God and see
that He is duty-bound to punish sin. Then we must go to His Word and see that
this punishment was all executed upon our Lord Jesus Christ, who had planned to
die in our stead!
How vain it is to trust in good feelings or bad ones! This is a habit the
enemy teaches. The only balm for a guilty conscience is the sight of Jesus
Christ hanging on the Cross, torn and bleeding out His life’s blood for us. It
is to hear Him say with His last breath, “It
is finished.”
For the next little while we are engaged in a great war with the enemies
of God. We must use every weapon within our reach. God’s army has taken hold
of the whole armor of God. Their loins are girt about with the Truths of the
Last Day Message, as revealed by Christ, Himself, to the Prophet William
Branham.
The Revelation of the Seven Seals has returned us to the Faith of the
Fathers. Once again God’s Army has on the Breastplate
of Righteousness (Eph.
Soon and very soon, His Army will be taken out, making way for the Gospel
to return to the Jews. Then will the two witnesses of Rev. 11:3 appear
and preach in
But, as we have said, for the moment we are engaged in a
great battle of the mind against the Philistines of evil. But we may comfort
ourselves with this God-sent thought, “I
have chosen thee in the furnace of affliction.” (Isa. 48:10) Yes,
afflictions will come, but His words fall on our ears as a shower of soft rain
on parched ground, “He has chosen us!” Let sickness come, He has chosen us,
and will deliver us from them all (Ps. 34:19). If poverty comes in our door, He
is already in our house, for He has chosen us! Family and friends may forsake us
in our beliefs, but He has chosen us! The Cross is the Devil’s answer! Having
been made “perfect” by our faith in the Life that was sacrificed there, we
have complete victory while living in the middle of our sin-pile of flesh. We
believe God and it is “counted unto us
for righteousness.” (Rom. 4:5) As we reason about our predicament it seems
to us we could glorify God more in this present life if our sinful nature had
been removed from us at our redemption. Yet, if this had been God’s will, He
would have done so when he regenerated us! No Devil, nor man, stops God’s
plan! He, Himself, has subjected us to vanity for reasons of His own (Rom.
QUOTE: PERFECT FAITH, PAGE 33, “……waiting for
that church to come into that Perfect Raptured Faith. ……I am looking for
it…….together we’ll make it by the grace of God.” Amen.
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