I had not intended to get to this teaching this soon; however, circumstances and “coincidences” (of which there are none in walking with the Lord) and some very obvious assaults by the enemy have led me to believe I need to get to this teaching now. It will be another series teaching, meaning it may cover two or more weeks, but have patience, and I think we’ll learn some things -- about ourselves, as well as about the Lord. Let me say up front...this will not be an easy teaching, either for me as I write, or for you as you read, but we will “plow ahead” nonetheless. (This was originally written in June of 1998, and it has been updated and re-edited on December 27, 1999 and as recently as February 4, 2004)

With God’s help and Grace, and because I have learned so much from so many, we will hopefully come out with a much clearer understanding on these matters of a covering. Now, as we begin, perhaps I should say (especially to the men): “Brace yourselves”, as we jump right into a rather difficult passage of scripture. The reason I “warn” the men is because we men must have a proper covering ourselves, before we can even hope to be a covering for anybody else. These next few verses will show us some of our “problem areas”, if we care to know.

Jeremiah 4: “(1) If you will return, O Israel”, says the LORD, “return unto Me; and if you will put away your abominations out of My sight, then shall you not remove (wander, flee or disappear). (2) And you will swear, ‘The LORD lives in Truth, in Judgment, and in Righteousness; and the nations shall bless themselves in Him, and in Him shall they glory’.”

(3) For thus says the LORD to the men of Judah and Jerusalem, “Break up your fallow ground, and sow not among thorns. (4) Circumcise yourselves to the LORD, and take away the foreskins of your heart, you men of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem, or else My fury will come forth like fire, and burn so that none can quench it, because of the evil of your doings.

(5) Declare in Judah, and publish in Jerusalem saying, ‘Blow the trumpet in the land; cry, gather together’, and say, ‘Assemble yourselves, and let us go into the defenced cities’. (6) Set up the standard toward Zion; retire, stay not; for I will bring evil from the north, and a great destruction.”

(7) “The lion is come up from his thicket, and the destroyer of the Gentiles is on his way; he is gone forth from his place to make your land desolate; and your cities shall be laid waste, without an inhabitant. (8) Because of all this, gird yourself with sackcloth -- lament and howl, for the fierce anger of the LORD is not turned back from us.”

(9) “And it shall come to pass at that day”, says the LORD, “that the heart of the king shall perish, as well as the heart of the princes; and the priests shall be astonished, and the prophets shall wonder”. (10) Then I (Jeremiah) said, “Ah, Lord GOD! Surely You have greatly deceived this people and Jerusalem, saying, ‘You shall have peace’, and yet the sword reaches unto the soul.”

The first thing we see here, is the Lord saying “return unto Me.” Generally speaking, this is the usual starting place of the Lord, calling us back to Himself; drawing us away from things that harm and divide and cause us pain, leading us back to His Healing and Unity and Peace. There is so much that harms us; so much that divides us; so much that disturbs our peace, but He is always there, working to restore and heal and create, if need be, a better way for us to live, breathe and have our being. This is Who God is -- a merciful, loving, gracious God, and we need to hear that and believe that more and more, for our lives are filled with too much fear, doubt and disunity.

Please believe me when I tell you, He is doing all that He can to rectify that situation, even when we feel He is ten thousand miles away. Long before you or I even knew Him; long before we were even thoughts in our families lives, He was there, planning and preparing a Way for us to live free and healthy lives. One of the first entries in my Geocities Guestbook is from a brother who answered my question “How long have you been saved?” with this reply: “Oh, about 2,000 years...”

And please know this -- I certainly am not making light of this brother’s reply, and I only mention it to make a point. Hebrews 4:4 tells us, “For he (referring to Moses, who wrote Genesis) spoke in a certain place of the seventh day in this manner, ‘And God did rest the seventh day from all His Works’.” Let’s take a closer look at Genesis, where this verse is found:

Gen. 2: (1) “Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. (2) And on the seventh day God ended His Work (meaning ministry or business) which He had made, and He rested (ceased) on the seventh day from all His work which He had made (committed Himself to, granted or provided for, as for us). (3) And God blessed the seventh day, sanctifying it, because in it (the seventh day) He had rested from all His Work which God created and made.”

The LORD had accomplished, finished, completed, and made an end to everything that would ever be needed in this universe, placing a dot or a period there, at that point in time. And when Jesus cried out from the cross, “It is finished!”, He was now placing an exclamation point in time and eternity, stating that He had now fulfilled all that had already been declared “before the foundation of the world”. How can I say that? The Greek word finished, used by Christ on that cross, means “to set out for a definite point or goal; the point aimed at as a limit, implying the conclusion of an act; the result -- either immediate, ultimate or prophetic.”

All that happened that day at Calvary, nearly 2,000 years ago, sealed the “destiny” of all who had come before that day, as well as all who would come after that day. In Hebrews 11, we are told --

“(13) These (speaking of the heroes of faith) all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of them, and embraced them, and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth. (14) For they that say such things declare plainly that they seek another country. (15) And truly, if they had been mindful of the country from whence they had come out, they might have had opportunity to have returned. (16) But now they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly place; wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for He has prepared for them a city.”

Those who had faith in God, looking forward to the Cross, which was the fulfillment of all things (even though they didn’t know exactly how this fulfillment might come), are no different from us, who look back to Calvary, believing and accepting the Work that was done there. Let me include a few more verses, then we’ll move on. Following the above thought, though, Peter tells us:

1st Peter 1: (18) “Forasmuch as you know that you were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold, from your vain conversation received by tradition from your fathers; (18) but (you were redeemed) with the precious Blood of Christ, as of a Lamb without blemish and without spot, (20) Who verily was foreordained before the foundation of the world, but was manifest in these last times for you, (21) and by Him you believe in God, Who raised Him up from the dead, and gave Him glory; that your faith and hope might be in God.”

Ephesians 1: “(3) Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Who has blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ, (4) according as He has chosen us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love. (5) He has predestinated (here’s a tricky word) us to the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the Good Pleasure of His Will, (6) to the praise of the glory of His Grace, wherein He has made us accepted in the beloved.”

Hebrews 4:3 “For we which have believed do enter into rest, as He said, As I have sworn in my wrath, if they shall enter into my rest...although the Works were finished from the foundation of the world.”

We will close this portion with a thought from Revelations, where John is telling us about the dragon and the beast.

Rev. 13: “(8) And all that dwell upon the earth shall worship him (the dragon and/or beast), whose names are not written in the Book of Life of the Lamb, Who was slain from the foundation of the world. (9) If any man has an ear, let him hear. (10) He that leads into captivity shall go into captivity; he that kills with the sword must be killed with the sword. Here is the patience and the faith of the saints.

We need nothing more; nothing can be added to make it better; nothing can be taken away to lessen its worth. When Jesus said, “It is finished”, He was stating a simple, but powerful Truth...IT is Finished! His Work, God’s Work, the Work of the Holy Trinity had been fulfilled and sealed -- nothing more was needed, except for us to accept this Work, and as we do we come under the Covering of the Work of Calvary. There is Life; there is Healing and Health; there is Peace; there is Rest.

The fact that many of us are not “free”, or we “struggle” with our health, or we don’t feel “at peace”, or we seem to be unable to “find” rest, does not disprove His Goodness or His Kindness, or even His willingness to be any of those things for us; it simply means we have not yet found a way to Him, in order to receive those things. And not only those things He desires to give us, but so much more.

There was a song that we sung in the ’70s; Calvary Covered It All, sung by David Sapp, I believe. I cannot tell you how many times, in the twenty-plus years passing, that I have found myself singing that song, as a comfort to my own heart and soul. I have been singing it even as I write these words. “All my sin and despair, Jesus took on Him there, Precious Calvary covered it all...”. I added the word “Precious”, and there is more, but I will only put down this much; I wouldn’t want to infringe anyone’s copyright.

And so, my brother or sister... when someone asks you “how long have you been saved?”, you may as well tell them “He chose me in Himself before the foundation of the world (Ephesians 1:4).” Don’t limit your relationship with Him to a mere 2,000 years! I say this with a smile.

I have wondered and fretted and prayed about this lack of spirituality and committment in the lives and hearts of most (if not all) men I knew. I am not saying this to be proud or arrogant or even to accuse, because the first ten years of my life walking with the Lord was certainly no picnic, and I spent much of that time praying for myself, asking God that I not be a castaway like Paul refers to in 1st Corinthians 9:27. I know what failure is and what it can do. You can ask my wife to attest to that.

I have seen satan run roughshod over the people of the Lord; I have seen families torn apart by divorce; I have known of suicides and drug problems and child abuse and other things not fit to mention -- and this all happening in supposedly Godly families and lives. I have seen and experienced failure, loss, depression, frustration and hopelessness, not all of which are necessarily due to a man’s lack of spirituality and/or committment. I say all of this just to assure anyone who might be wondering...we all suffer; we all have tasted of failure; we all have been weak and sinful, disappointing our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

But...and I feel I must say this...the real failure is that we men of the church -- the heads and leaders -- have not done a very good job being what Christ called and told us to be. I will explain this in more detail, as we study this out further, and, again, let me say, I am not writing these words to criticize, ridicule or to bring despair to anyone’s heart. It is my prayer and my hope that, by the time we are done with this particular subject, we will all feel a lot better about ourselves and about our walk with Him and beneath Him...for He is, after all, our covering.

What is fallow ground? The meaning is one which we need to look at on several levels. First, fallow ground is “land plowed up but left unsown for a season.” We can also derive from this meaning another meaning: “untrained; uncultivated, as of the heart or mind”; or “inactivity; absence of action, motion or movement”.

Anyone who has ever plowed the ground or even walked along a plowed row, understands that no matter how well you plow, there will always be clods of dirt that need to be broken up. And after a period of “inactivity”, there will certainly be more plowing that needs to be done. At least that’s what the Word here is speaking of...breaking up the plowed ground, where clods and large chunks of dirt are a hindrance to the tender plants in the Lord’s Vineyard. Fallow ground is a section of field that has been plowed, but left unattended for a period of time; it will tend to get “rough” and not suited for healthy growth, until such a time as one will come and break up the fallow ground . The fallow ground in our lives can be many things, but let’s look at one definition I mentioned above: “untrained; uncultivated, as of the heart or mind”; or “inactivity; absence of action, motion or movement”.

Untrained -- One of the bigger problems in the church, in the Body of Christ, has been the continual neglect of discipling people, and when and where you do find those who are discipling people, you may very likely find misuse and abuse of authority and power. I remember the seventies and into the eighties, when there was a shepherding teaching spreading throughout our land, if not the whole world (God only knows how far this false teaching reached). Some of those responsible for the “spread” of this teaching were men I had actually “sat under” -- men who had taught at Christ for the Nations Institute in 1970-1971, the year I attended there.

Most of these men were wonderful teachers, having wonderful insights into the Word of God, but some of them “strayed” (as we men are sometimes tempted to do) with their thoughts and ideals. It would serve no purpose to name these men; some of you know who they are; some of you have served with them and under them. The point here is, the “Shepherding teaching” may have started off “all right”, and it may have begun “centered on God’s Word”, but somewhere, somehow, for some reason they “deviated” from the Truth of that Word.

Some of you may wonder: What is shepherding? The simple answer is: It is the teaching that all of God’s sheep need shepherds...and this is certainly true. But from here we can go into many diverse directions. The question is -- how much shepherding do sheep need? This is a hard question, for I have seen so many variables in the churches we have been in, it is not easily answered, but we will try. Some sheep need more direction than others; this is good and this is necessary in the Kingdom of God, but when directions turn into directives, then you have a major problem. But what is the difference?

Directions can be given in a variety of ways, ending in a variety of results. I can give you directions from my house to the nearest shopping mall; I can write them all down on a map and even show lines and arrows and north and south and the whole nine yards. And because you now have a map of directions, you can take that map, stick it in your pocket, and go to that mall whenever your heart desires. However -- for many different reasons -- when you do decide to go, you may not go the route I drew out.

For example, after getting in your car to go to that mall, you might notice that you need gas. On your way to the mall you may see a gas station, stop for gas, talk to the attendant, find better directions to the mall, and then you might decide to take his advice. Will I be angry that you did not take my directions? I better not be that petty. But, in this next case, if I had given you directives, I could easily get upset.

Directives, on the other hand, are another matter altogether. A directive is more of an authoritative order or instruction. It is more controlling, more insistent, and more demanding. A directive would not have allowed you to go to that mall any other way than the way that you were instructed to go. There is no room for variations, because those who give the directive firmly insist it is for your own good to follow their way. They might even claim they want you to make no “error” and they do not want you to “stray” or “get lost”, perhaps “losing” valuable time. There are always reasons for strict and harsh directives, and they may all seem proper, on the surface.

In the early eighties, right at the peak of this shepherding thing, the Lord began to teach me some things about “witchcraft in the church”. I still remember my reaction...“No way, Lord; this cannot be happening in the churches of America. Maybe in some third-world countries overseas, but here in America? No way!” He began showing me three words; I began to see them and hear them and I could not get away from them. The words?

• Manipulation
• Intimidation
• Domination

This shepherding teaching of the seventies ushered in these three terrible nouns into the eighties, until they have taken deep roots, infecting and affecting the churches of America. Manipulation, intimidation and domination have ushered in God-only-knows-what into the nineties, and one can only guess at what the next decade or so will be like, if the church does not waken itself out of its drunken stupor. One of the things I have already seen in the closing days of this decade is the open disregard for and the resistance against the Holy Spirit and the anointing of the Lord. I have seen and heard things that should make us all weep and hang our heads in shame.

But do not worry, for the Lord is never unaware of these things; that is another thing the Lord taught me over fifteen years ago. He never sleeps, never slumbers, and is never surprised by anything. He is Omniscient, meaning All-Knowing; He is Omni-Present (everywhere, seeing everything); He is, of course Omnipotent (All-Powerful), and one of the things He is doing today, in the church -- at this point in time -- is to bring the men of the church back to a place of being righteous men of God.

And, as I said earlier, we men must have a proper covering before we can expect to be proper coverings for our families or our ministries. Part of the sad, sad thing of so many ministers “falling from grace” in the seventies and eighties (and even the nineties), was the obvious fact that these men had no covering. We could see (after the messes had been clearly revealed) that these men had no responsibilty or accountability to anyone -- only to themselves and their families, and this is not a very safe way to do the Lord’s Business.

Men of the Lord...servants of the Living God: You must have a safe covering; you must know and understand what and Who your covering is. It cannot be guesswork, nor can it be hopeful or wishful thinking. Jesus Christ is the Head. Honor Him, in all you do, and in honoring Him, you must honor His Body. To cause harm to His Body, even in the slightest way, causes harm to Him; to dishonor His Body, even in the slightest way, brings dishonor to Him. There is no way around this responsiblity. We are responsible; we are accountable; we will stand before Him One Day, giving account of what we did to Him, through His Body...do not be deceived; this will happen...you know it and I know it.

The key words here are “seeds of righteousness”, so why would anyone sow among thorns? I’m sure there are excellent lessons and teachings on why some, who plant, sow their crops among thorns, but whenever Jesus speaks of thorns or thorny ground, it doesn’t have a very positive light to it. Sowing among thorns is the same as if we just casually tossed our seeds anywhere and everywhere, allowing the “thorns of life” to spring up and choke out anything that they (the seeds) were meant to be. Look at the parable that Jesus spoke, concerning the seed and the sower --

Matthew 13:3 & Luke 8:5-15 -- (we’ll look at Luke 8:14 here) : “And that which fell among thorns are those, which, when they have heard, go forth, and are choked with cares and riches and pleasures of this life, and bring no fruit to perfection.”

As servants of the Lord, we must be so careful where we sow and how we sow. As God sows “seeds of righteousness” within our hearts, let us be certain to sow Good Seed among the hungry, thirsty, hurting sheep of His Pasture, and should we find a “stray” or even a lost soul, let us be kind and patient with our dealings, so that they may have much fruit to perfection.

These words I speak, primarily, to the men who desire to serve Him, to know Him and to follow Him, no matter where He may lead. I do not neglect the women, but please allow me to address the men, so that we may get ourselves in order before the Lord, that we may be better husbands, better fathers, better pastors, better men of God, better coverings as Christ has ordained, for He has ordained such a thing.

But what does that which He has ordained really mean? Let’s go right to the most controversial verses concerning men and women, and see if perhaps the Lord will give us some clear insight. To continue this teaching, click here: Covering, continued.