Author: Billy Conrad

June 21

Then Jesus said to His disciples, “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me.” — Matthew 16:24

Scripture reading: Matthew 10:16–42

We must acknowledge our helplessness and nothingness.
Although laboring in the Spirit is painful, God can lift the
burden from us. I have had those days when I feel burdened. I have had it this morning, but now God is lifting the heaviness. And I say, brother and sister, unless God brings us into a place of brokenness of spirit, unless God remolds us in the great plan of His will for us, the best of us will utterly fail. But when we are absolutely taken in hand by the almighty God, God turns even our weakness into strength. He makes even that barren, helpless, groaning cry come forth, so that men and women are reborn in the travail. There is a place where our helplessness is touched by the power of God and where we come out shining as “gold refined in the fire” (Revelation 3:18).

It was on the cross that our Lord died with a broken heart.
Pentecost came out of jeering and sneering. It included being mocked and beaten and an offer of sour wine. Jesus received an unfair judgment and a cross that He had to bear. But, glory to God, Pentecost rings out today for you through the words, “It is finished!” (John 19:30). And now because it is finished, we can take the same place that He took and rise out of that death in majestic glory with the resurrection touch of heaven. People will know that God has done something for us.

Thought for today: There is no hope for Pentecost unless we come to God in our brokenness.

June 20

Love has been perfected among us in this: that we may have boldness in the day of judgment; because as He is, so are we in this world. — 1 John 4:17

Scripture reading: Hebrews 2

You ask, “Can we see the Master?” Here, look at Him. His
Word is Spirit and life-giving. This is the breath, the Word of
Jesus. Through the Holy Spirit, men have written and spoken. Here is the life. Here is the witness. Here is the truth. Here is the Son of God “revealed from faith to faith” (Romans 1:17), from heart to heart, from vision to vision, until we all come into perfect unity of fellowship into the fullness of Christ.

There it is, beloved. Look! “Now we are children of God” (1
John 3:2). If you are there, we can take a step further. But if you are not there, you may hear but not cross over. There is something about the Word of God that benefits the hearer who has faith, but if the hearer does not have faith, it will not profit him.

The future is what you are today, not what you are going to be tomorrow. This is the day when God makes the future possible. When God reveals something to you today, tomorrow is filled with a further illumination of God‘s possibility for you.

Do you dare to come into the place of omnipotence, of wonderment? Do you dare to say to God, “I am ready for all that You have for me”? It will mean living a pure and holy life. It will mean living a sanctified, separate life. It will mean your heart is so perfect and your prospects are so divinely separated that you say to the world, “Goodbye.”

The second chapter of Hebrews describes the mighty, glorified position for the children of God. God wants me to announce it to every heart, like a great trumpet call. The plan is to bring you to glory as a child clothed with the power of the gifts, graces, ministries, and operations. You are to be clothed with the majesty of heaven. This is like heaven to me. My very body is filled with thoughts of heaven.

Seeing that these things are so, what kind of people should we be (2 Peter 3:11)? We should be keeping our eyes upon Him so that we may be ready for the Rapture. Oh, brothers and sisters, what immense pleasure God has for us! There is no limit to the sobermindedness God is bringing us to so that we may be able to understand all that God has planned for us. Oh, that we may look not on the things that are, but with eyes of purity see only the invisible Son. Having our whole bodies illuminated by the power of the Holy Spirit, we grow in grace, in faith, and in Christlikeness until there is no difference between us and Him.

Are you prepared to go all the way? Are you willing for your
heart to have only one attraction? Are you willing to have only one Love? Are you willing for Him to become your perfect Bridegroom?

The more bridelike we are, the more we love to hear the Bridegroom‘s voice; the less bridelike we are, the less we long for His Word. If you cannot rest without it, if it becomes your food day and night, if you eat and drink of it, His life will be in you, and when He appears, you will go with Him. Help us, Jesus!

How many of you are prepared to reveal yourselves before the King? Are you prepared to yield to His call, yield to His will, yield to His desires? How many are going to say, “At all costs I will go through!” Who says so? Who means it? Are you determined? Is your soul on the wing? Make a full consecration to God right now. It is between you and God. You are going now to enter the presence of God.

Thought for today: Come clean with everything in the presence of God!

June 19

If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me. — Revelation 3:20

Scripture reading: Colossians 1:9–23

Look at the tremendous power of God behind our inheritance. First, we are adopted; then we receive an inheritance; then we are made coheirs with Jesus. God touches our souls, making our whole bodies cry out for the living God.

Do you want God? Do you want fellowship in the Spirit? Do
you want to walk with Him? Do you desire communion with Him? Everything else is no good. You want the association with God, and God says, “I will come in to [you] and dine with [you], and [you] with Me.” Hallelujah! We can attain spiritual maturity, fullness of Christ, a place where God becomes the perfect Father and the Holy Spirit has a rightful place now as never before.

The Holy Spirit breathes through us, enabling us to say, “You are my Father.” Because you have been adopted, “God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying out, “Abba, Father!’” (Galatians 4:6). May God the Holy Spirit grant to us that richness of His pleasure, that unfolding of His will, that consciousness of His smile upon us. There is “no condemnation” (Romans 8:1). We find that “the law of the Spirit of life” makes us “free from the law of sin and death” (v. 2). Glory!

If we see the truth as clearly as God intends for us to see it, we will all be made so much richer, looking forward to the Blessed One who is coming again. Here we are, face-to-face with the facts. God has shown us different aspects of the Spirit. He has shown us the pavilion of splendor. He has revealed to us the power of the relationship of sonship. He has shown us that those who are God‘s children bear His image. They actively claim the rights of their adoption. They speak, and it is done. They bind the things that are loose, and loose the things that are bound (Matthew 16:19). And the perfection of sonship is so evident that more and more people are becoming children of God.

Do you believe it? Let us see you act it. Beloved, God the Holy Spirit has a perfect plan to make us a movement. There is a difference between a movement and a monument. A movement is something that is always active. A monument is something that is erected on a corner and neither speaks nor moves, but there is a tremendous lot of humbug and nonsense to get it in place. It is silent and does nothing. A movement is where God comes into the very being of a person, making him active for God. He is God‘s property, God‘s mouthpiece, God‘s eyes, and God‘s hands. God will “sanctify you completely” (1 Thessalonians 5:23).

The sanctification of the eyes, the hands, the mouth, the ears—to be so controlled by the Spirit who lives within us—is a wonderful place for God to bring us to. “Beloved, now we are children of God; and it has not yet been revealed what we shall be” (1 John 3:1–2). What a great thought: to be heirs, “joint heirs with Christ” (Romans 8:17); to receive revelations and kindnesses from God; to have God dwell within man. The believer is filled, moved, and intensified until he takes wing. It would not take a trumpet to rouse him, for he is already on the wing, and he will land very soon. He would hear God‘s voice no matter how much noise surrounded him.

Everything that is going to help you, you have to make yours. He has stored it up already. You don‘t need a stepladder to get to it. It is ready to be handed to you when you become joined with Him. Beloved, it is impossible in our finite condition to estimate the lovingkindness or the measureless mind of God. When we come into like-mindedness with the Word, instead of looking at the Word, we begin to see what God has for us in the Word. Our prayer will be,

Me with a quenchless thirst inspire,
A longing, infinite desire
Fill my craving heart.
Less than Thyself You do not give,
Thy might within me now to live.
Come, all Thou hast.

God, please come and make it impossible for me to ever be satisfied but to always have an unquenchable desire for You, the living God. Then I will not be overtaken. Then I will be ready. Then I will have shining eyes, filled with delight as they look at the Master.

Thought for today: Will you shiver like someone hesitating on the edge of a pool? Or will you take a plunge into omnipotence and find the waters are not as cold as people told you?

June 18

For with the heart one believes unto righteousness.
—Romans 10:10

Scripture reading: Psalm 57

May God show us that the only thing that is ever going to
help us is the heart. It is the heart where we believe in
faith. It is the heart that is inhabited by the Spirit. It is
the heart that is moved by God. The mind is always secondary.

The heart conceives, the mind reflects, and the mouth is operated. But you must not try to reverse the order. Some people are all tongue, neither head nor heart. But when He comes, there is perfect order. It is as right as rain. Look how it comes! The heart believes and then like a ventilator, it flows through and quickens the mind. Then the tongue speaks of the glory of the Lord.

The Scriptures are perfect, the sacrifice is perfect, the revelation is perfect. Everything is so divinely adjusted by God Almighty that every person who comes into infinite revelation touched by God sees that the whole canon of Scripture is perfect from the beginning to the end. Not a single thing in the Scriptures clashes with or contradicts the Spirit and makes trouble.

When the power of God surges through the whole life, the
Word becomes the personality of the subject. We become the subjects of the Spirit of the living God, and we are moved by the power of God until “we live and move and have our being” (Acts 17:28) within this flow of God‘s integrity. What a wonderful adjustment for weaknesses! God is able to shake us thoroughly, to send a wind and blow the chaff away until it will never be seen anymore. God is able to refine us in a way that everyone would desire to proclaim His praises:

It is better to shout than to doubt,
It is better to rise than to fail,
It is better to let the glory out,
Than to have no glory at all.

I am the last man to say anything about fasting, praying, or
anything that has been a source of blessing to others. But I have learned by personal experience that I can get more out of one moment‘s faith than I can get out of a month‘s yelling. I can get more by believing God in a moment than I can get by screaming for a month. Also, I am positive that blessing comes out of fasting when the fasting is done in the right way. But I find so many people who make up their minds to fast, and they finish with a thick head, troubled bones, and sleepy conditions. I am satisfied that that is no way to fast. A way to fast is described in many Scriptures.

Praying and fasting go together. The Spirit leads you to pray. The Spirit holds on to you until you forget even the hour or the day, and you are so caught up by the power of the Spirit that you want nothing, not even food or drink. Then God gets His plan through because He has you through and through. So the Lord of Hosts, I trust, will “surround [us] with songs of deliverance” (Psalms 32:7) and give us inward revelations until our whole beings will be uplifted.

Who dares to believe God? Who dares to claim his rights? What are your rights? “Now we are children of God” (1 John 3:2). This is a position of absolute rest, a position of faith. It is a place of perfect trust and perfect habitation where there are no disturbances. You experience peace like a river. Look at the face of God. Hallelujah! The very Word that comes to judge comes to help.

The law came as a judgment, but when the Spirit comes and breathes through the law, He comes to lift us higher and higher. Hallelujah! We must go a little further. God comes to us and says, “I will make it all right if you dare believe.”

All the great things of God come to us as we realize our sinfulness before Him. Instead of hiding as Adam and Eve did when they realized they were naked (Genesis 3:7–10), we should come to God to be clothed. We cannot associate with the evil of this world. If you can be attracted by anything earthly, you have missed the greatest association that God has for you. If your property, your money, your friends, or any human thing can attract you from God, you are not His child in this respect. Come into line with God‘s Word. Let us encounter the Word; let us face God and see if this thing re
ally is so.

Thought for today: Many people have lost out because their minds prevent them from letting God reach their hearts.

June 17

Behold what manner of love the Father has bestowed on us, that we should be called children of God! — 1 John 3:1

Scripture reading: John 1:1–13

God has done something marvelous for the believer. He has taken him out of the world. It is a remarkable word that Jesus said: “I do not pray that You should take them out of the world…They are not of the world” (John 17:15–16). It is a great truth for us to understand. In this glorious position of God‘s own, we come to a place where we know with confidence, we say it without fear of contradiction from our own hearts or even outside voices, “Beloved, now we are children of God” (1 John 3:2).

I want us to examine ourselves in the light of the Word. God
has definitely purposed that we should inherit all of the Scriptures, but we must meet the requirements necessary to claim them. Remember this, there are any number of things you may quote without possessing the essential reality of them. I want us to have something more than the literal word. Words are of no importance unless the believer has the assurance of the abiding of those words. You can quote the words of Scripture without being in the place of victory.

Any person who has come to the place of this word, “He who is in you is greater than he who is in the world” (1 John 4:4), is mightier than all the powers of darkness, mightier than the power of disease, mightier than his own self. There is something reigning supremely great in him more than in the world when he is in that place. But we must come to the place of knowledge. It is not sufficient for you to quote the Word of God. You never come to a place of righteousness and truth until you are in possession of the promises contained in the Word.

Beloved, God wants us to be something more than ordinary
people. Remember this: if you are ordinary, you have not reached the ideal principles of God. The only thing that God has for a man is to be extraordinary. God has no room for an ordinary man. There are millions of ordinary people in the world. But when God takes hold of a man, He makes him extraordinary in personality, power, thought, and activity.

“Beloved, now we are children of God” (1 John 3:2). It is a divine plan fashioned by His divine will. God has not given anything that He does not mean for us to attain. God means for us to possess all these things. “Beloved, now we are children of God.” God has such purposes to perform in us that He has a great desire to utter these words in our hearts so that we may rise, that we may claim, that we may be ambitious, that we may be covetous for these purposes, that there may be something in us that nothing can satisfy unless we not only tow the line but also live in the line and claim the whole thing as ours.

You will never reach ideal purposes in any way unless you become the living epistle of the Word by the power of the Holy Spirit. You become the living force of the revelation of God, the incarnation of the personality of His presence in the human soul. Then you know that you are His children. Look at Christ. He is the most beautiful of all. He is utterly glorious, passionate for God, filled with all the fullness of God. He came to earth in the glory of the majesty of His Father, and He stood in the earth in human form.

I like to think about the manifestation of the power of God.
God came and resided in flesh, in weakness, under the law—for you. He came in human form, worshiped in it, lived in it, and moved in it. Some even recognized Him as the Son of God.

Beloved, there is the principle. The remarkable position of
every soul is to be so inhabited by Jesus as to become a living personality of God‘s ideal Son. It is very remarkable and beautiful. God has these divine plans for us. So many people believe that because they are in the flesh, they are always to be in the place of weakness. Friends, your weaknesses have to be swallowed up with the ideal of Him who never failed.

Every time He was tried, He came out victorious. He “was in
all points tempted as we are, yet without sin” (Heb. 4:15). The purpose for His temptations was so that He might be able to help all who are tempted and tried and oppressed in any way. He was the great embodiment of God to human life. He came to expose our weaknesses so that we might behold His mightiness. Through Him, we can be strong in the Lord. Praise the Lord!

Thought for today: It is always all right when He is Almighty.

June 16

That I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings. — Philippians 3:10

Scripture reading: Philippians 3

Jesus had what Paul desired. Paul knew Jesus by revelation as we do. He did not know Him from being with Him in His human ministry as the other apostles did. Paul saw that Jesus lived in resurrection power. Paul wanted to gain the rest of faith, so he refused all hindrances and pressed on. He wanted to remove any interference that stood in the way of his knowing Christ. Before facing the Cross, Jesus told His disciples to “stay here and watch” (Mark 14:34) while He went further in the garden to pray.

One day Jesus came upon a funeral procession. A widow‘s only son had died, and Jesus‘ great heart had compassion for her. He touched her son in his coffin and said, “Young man, I say to you, arise” (Luke 7:14). Death had no power; it could not hold him: “He who was dead sat up and began to speak” (v. 15). Oh, compassion is greater than death, greater than suffering. Oh, God, give it to us.

One day, I saw a woman with tumors. In the condition she was in, she could not live out that day. I said, ― “Do you want to live?” She could not speak, but she was able to move her finger. In the name of Jesus, I anointed her with oil. Mr. Fisher, who was with me, said, ― “She‘s gone!”

It had been a little blind girl who had led me to this dying
mother‘s bedside. Compassion broke my heart for that child. I had said to the mother, ― “Lift your finger.” Carrying the mother across the room, I put her against the wardrobe. I held her there. I said, ―In the name of Jesus, death, come out.‖ Like a fallen tree, leaf after leaf, her body began moving. Upright instead of lifeless, her feet touched the floor. ― “In Jesus‘ name, walk,” I said. She did, back to her bed.

I told this story in the service. There was a doctor there who said, ― “I‘ll prove that.” He saw her and confirmed that the story was true. She told the doctor: ― “It is all true. I was in heaven, and I saw countless numbers all like Jesus. He pointed, and I knew I had to go. Then I heard a voice saying, “Walk, in the name of Jesus.‘”

There is power in His resurrection. There is a “righteousness which is from God by faith” (Philippians 3:9). Are we able to comprehend it? Can we have it? It is His love. It is His life in us. It is His compassion.

See that you understand and possess the righteousness of God. Do not miss it. Oh, do not miss knowing Christ! It is the “righteousness which is from God by faith”—the rest of faith.

Thought for today: We are here on probation to slay the Enemy and destroy the kingdoms of darkness, to move among satanic forces and subdue them in the name of Jesus.

June 15

I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. — Philippians 3:14

Scripture reading: Philippians 3:1–21

God‘s Word is our food. If we do not edify ourselves with it, our needs will not be met. Let us preach by our lives, actions, presence, and praise, always being living letters of Christ. We should strive to be examples to all men of the truth contained in the Word of God.

Follow the truth, and do not abandon it. Always be watchful
for divine inspiration. If we were to go all the way with God, what would happen? Seek the honor that comes from God alone. Paul spoke about the desire to attain. He said that he reached for “the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 3:14). There is no standing still. We are renewed by the Spirit.

Abraham left his home and followed God to a new land (Genesis 12:1–4). We never get into a new place until we come out of the old one. We must model God‘s personality. We can never be satisfied to stay where we are spiritually, for the truth continues to enlighten us. We must move on, or we will perish. We must be obedient to the Holy Spirit who guides us.

Paul was a man who had kept the law blamelessly. He had
tried in his humanity to follow an ideal standard. Then Paul saw a light from heaven, and he was made new. Are you new? He was not with the other apostles, but he had been told of “the Word of life” (1 John 1:1). He had not yet attained to these ideal principles, but he had zeal. Before him was a challenge. He was to “go into the city” (Acts 9:6) where he would be told what to do. The present was nothing to him; he was motivated to follow God‘s command. Everything that had been important to him before, he now counted “loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus [his] Lord” (Philippians 3:8). His chief goal was to “gain Christ” (v. 8).

When Judas and the soldiers came after Jesus in the Garden, Jesus spoke, and the men fell backward (John 18:6). He, the Creator, submitted Himself to these men. Yet He said, “Let these go their way” (v. 8), referring to the disciples. When they abused Him, He did not retaliate. Paul understood these Christlike principles. He recognized the power of Christ, which is able to lift our humanity.

Jesus‘ followers sought to make Him a King, but Jesus retired to pray. Paul desired to “gain Christ and be found in Him” (Philippians 3:8–9). Oh, can I gain Him? Is it possible to change and change, having His compassion, His love?

In an effort to prevent Jesus from being taken, Peter cut off
Malchus‘s ear (John 18:10). Jesus put it on again. See the dignity of Christ, who comes to create a new order of life. May we “gain Christ and be found in Him” so that we might have the “righteousness which is from God by faith” (Philippians 3:8–9).

Jesus identified Himself with us. He came to be a firstfruit (1 Cor. 15:23). How zealous is the farmer as he watches his crops to see the first shoots and blades of the harvest! Jesus was a firstfruit, and God will have a harvest. What a lovely position to be children of God, perfectly adjusted in the presence of God and “found in Him” (Philippians 3:9)! You say, ―It is a trying morning, “or ―I am in a needy place.” He knows and understands your needs. When Jesus saw a great crowd coming toward Him, He said to Philip, “Where shall we buy bread, that these may eat?” (John 6:5). Jesus knew where the food would come from. He was testing Philip‘s faith. From a little boy‘s lunch, Jesus fed over five thousand. They were all filled, and twelve baskets of bread were left over (v. 13).

Thought for today: Although we are always striving for more of God, we have a sense of contentment in Him.

June 14

Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.
— Hebrews 4:16

Scripture reading: Hebrews 4

Friends, it is the purpose of God that you should rise into the place of sonship. Don‘t miss the purpose God has in His
heart for you. Realize that God wants to make of you the
firstfruits (James 1:18) and separate you unto Himself. God has lifted some of you up again and again. It is amazing how God in His mercy has restored and restored, and “whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified” (Romans 8:30). The glorification is still going on and is going to exceed what it is now.

Within your heart there surely must be a response to this call. It does not matter who is against us: “What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us?” (v. 31). If there are millions against you, God has purposed it and will bring you right through to glory. Human wisdom has to stand still. It is “with the heart one believes unto righteousness” (Romans 10:10).

Brothers and sisters, what do you want God to do for you?
That is the question. What have you come here for? We have seen God work in horribly diseased bodies. Our God is able to heal and to meet all of our needs. The Scripture says, “He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?” (Romans 8:32).

Do you need to be healed of a critical spirit? The Scripture
warns: “Who shall bring a charge against God‟s elect?” (v. 33). I tell you, it is bad business for the man who harms God‘s anointed (1 Chronicles 16:21–22). “Who is he who condemns?” (Romans 8:34). How much of that there is today: brother condemning brother, everybody condemning one another. You also go about condemning yourself. The Devil is the “accuser of [the] brethren” (Revelation 12:10). But there is power in the blood of Christ to free us, to keep us, and to bring us healing.

Do not let the Enemy cripple you and bind you. Why don‘t you believe God‘s Word? There is a blessed place for you in the Holy Spirit. Instead of condemning you, Christ is interceding for you. Rest in this promise:

For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Romans 8:38–39)

Beloved, you are in a wonderful place. Because you are sons and joint heirs, you have a right to healing for your bodies and to be delivered from all the power of the Enemy.

Thought for today: Because God has called and chosen you, He wants you to know that you have power with Him.