These days we hear a lot of believers talking about a shift taking place, or how a great harvest will be reaped and even how one can expect many blessings from the Lord as an answer to prayer for resolve to pressing circumstances, financial needs and favorable outcomes.

But did you know that when God talks about a harvest, blessings and prosperity, He is in fact pointing to His Christ? God is speaking of how we reap the benefits of His rewards in the fruit of the Spirit, which are things unseen, because the covenant He established by His blood had transitioned faith from temporal things to the spiritual realm of His Kingdom.

When talking about a harvest in context to God’s new covenant terms we are talking about reaping the fruits of His righteousness in the heart which is the true work of the Spirit. As God provides contrast between the expectation of the earthy church (reaping answers to prayer) and His true church (reaping the fruits of righteousness), He is going through the process of separation before the rapture takes place.

The true church has been planted by the Lord and separated from those of the world (the tares who look like believers but are void of His virtue within); and being gathered together in one house, we are prepared for His return. God’s blessings are now being poured out upon His end time church to return her to God’s fullness in beauty, honor and strength as kings and priests of the Most High.

Psalm 147:12-15
¹² Praise the LORD, O Jerusalem; praise thy God, O Zion.

¹³ For he hath strengthened the bars of thy gates; he hath blessed thy children within thee.

¹⁴ He maketh peace in thy borders, and filleth thee with the finest of the wheat.

¹⁵ He sendeth forth his commandment upon earth: his word runneth very swiftly.

Praise springs forth from an obedient heart, which obedience always ties to the covenant God initiated for man’s sanctified service to Him. Looking at the above verse, king David was meditating on the word of the Lord within the context of the law of Moses as he was yet under the old covenant God made with Israel. His thoughts were geared towards God in the testimony of praise. His heart sang forth praise unto the Lord because the hand of the Lord was upon him (God’s steward) as he was obedient to the direction the Lord gave in all his ways.

His praise sprang forth from an obedient heart geared towards serving the Lord in truth. The same goes for us today in the new covenant priesthood Christ established by His blood. Although the covenants changed from physical tools used by the priests according to the pattern God gave through Moses, to the spiritual priesthood Christ established by His blood, God does not change. He is faithful to fulfill the terms of the new covenant to oversee our fruitfulness in Him.

Throughout the book of Genesis we see the Lord repeat the words: “Be fruitful and multiply”, in which He set a physical example in all things He created to minister of the greater spiritual harvesting of fruit in our hearts. God’s commandment is still the same for us spiritually, “Be fruitful and multiply”. Just as in nature, the seed of the tree set the pattern for the fruit that is borne upon its branches, so also does God first establish the pattern of truth in our hearts and then works His fruit within our soul. The pattern comes first and then the fruit.

Everything God does is by divine design to reveal Jesus Christ to enable us to work with the pattern of His truth. This is important for our discernment because God sets restrictions in place for the increase of His fruit to take place. In the old covenant God restricted the faith of the children of Israel to the physical things He selected (temple, tools, sacrifice). These were physical tokens that foreshadowed the work that Jesus would do in us to create His fruits of righteousness in our hearts. It is through this fruit the Lord would be praised.

Leviticus 26:9
For I will have respect unto you, and make you fruitful, and multiply you, and establish my covenant with you.

1 Timothy 1:5
Now the end of the commandment is charity out of a pure heart, and of a good conscience, and of faith unfeigned.

“the end of the commandment” means that all the law of Moses pointed to Christ and His new covenant. The new covenant commandment is realized in Jesus Christ, as He is identified as the expression of God’s love toward us.

“charity out of a pure heart” talks about the fruits of righteousness that God daily crafts within us. These fruits of the Spirit express the work of God in us. Charity is the expression of the ongoing work of God to change our nature as He heals the soul from Satan’s scars (false perceptions), and births His fruits within according to the design of His heart. This is the fruit God is harvesting.

The fruit we bear unto the Father is according to His planting of truth within our heart. The seed of truth is watered by grace to produce an offspring (work of the Spirit) after His own kind. We are born from above, and our faith bears the likeness of Christ, and the evidence of that is seen in the fruits of righteousness that are sown within.

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Fruit formed within through sanctified contact with God is not born of man’s imagination, nor is it character traits that people tend to confuse with the fruits of God’s Spirit.

We can understand that much correction is taking place in the church as God shifts the focus of believers to get involved with His transition to covenant. Restoration is coming through Jesus’ restored apostolic stewardship through whom a new work is taking place: the foundation of truth is re-set in the heart and believers are again learning how to function in their priesthood.

God is birthing in His church a remnant bride who bear the fruit of Christ, and this is the harvest He shall receive unto Himself upon His return. The Lord has restored the spiritual covenant according to the apostles’ doctrine to provide a sanctified environment for the birthing process to take place on His terms.

Acts 2:42
And they continued stedfastly in the apostles’ doctrine and fellowship, and in breaking of bread, and in prayers.

The pure conscience reflects the fruits of the Spirit being born within, which is the desire of God’s heart because the conscience then reflects Christ, and this is how faith is unfeigned (as we read earlier in 1 Tim. 1:5). The pure conscience is something that is not known in the early church, so I want to read again Apostle Paul’s instruction to bring out the teaching point of the Holy Spirit.

1 Timothy 1:5
Now the end of the commandment is charity out of a pure heart, and of a good conscience, and of faith unfeigned.

1 Timothy 3:9
Holding the mystery of the faith in a pure conscience.

The pure conscience shows that we are tethered to the power and promise of God’s throne and not something made up in the imagination of man, and why this tethering is necessary for us to be fruitful in the good works of God’s kingdom, even as Apostle Paul teaches.

Colossians 1:10-12
¹⁰ That ye might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God;

¹¹ Strengthened with all might, according to his glorious power, unto all patience and longsuffering with joyfulness;

¹² Giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light.

Romans 12:1
I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.

Apostle Paul brings to our attention that to walk worthy of the Lord the conscience must be pure and thoughts set in order for our reasonable service (that we would be fruitful) to God. God set an example for us about what “reasonable service” in the priests of old. The Levitical priesthood had a specific pattern of service given through the steward, Moses, for their works to meet God’s expectation perfectly.

In this, God teaches us about the new covenant priesthood, upon which He sprinkled His blood. The pattern given in the foundation of truth lays the pattern for the spiritual works of Jesus’ covenant for the Spirit to initiate our increase, strength, and joy.

We have the knowledge of Jesus’ new, spiritual tools that have been restored to the church. It is God’s provision for believers to be transitioned to the fullness of Christ’s promises once sealed into the new covenant and instructed in His priesthood. This is where the increase is; where the Spirit breathes life upon the knowledge to form living fruit in the soul which becomes our new reality as we daily experience the grace of God, forming this work within, and changing your perspective to see things from His eyes, as opposed to what the natural man would dictate as reality.