CONTENTS  Preface  1. Born Anew  2. Scriptural Teaching on Evangelism  3. Practicing Evangelism  4. How to Pray  5. Sanctified Christian Living  6. In the Spirit 7. Forming Fellowships  8. Training for Ministry  9. Prayer and Ministry  10. One in the Body  11. New Testament Order 12. On to Maturity

12. On to Maturity In our worship and in our ministry there are three possible levels of experience. The level at which our ministry is conducted depends upon and cannot rise higher than the level of our worship. These three levels of worship and ministry are represented by the three parts of the Tabernacle: Worship at the Natural Level. The first level, represented by the Courtyard of the Tabernacle, is the level of the soul or of natural human effort. Worship at this level follows an order of worship or liturgy designed by men (often written by a committee), which is always the same for any given church or group of churches. Certain people, called clergy, are designated to read the liturgy, or to “lead the worship.” In addition to performing the liturgy, clergy usually preach and teach, using sermons or lectures which they have written. They deliver the fruit of their study and meditation on Scripture, divine truth and morals. In this kind of worship, there are clergy who take an active part in leading the worship and lay people who are mainly passive, only making occasional set responses or joining in the singing of hymns. The liturgy may be very beautifully and effectively done. But there is no real fellowship among the participants in the sense of interchange or caring for each other. As long as they remain at the natural level, the worship will be a performance, however well done of a set ritual and ceremony. This type of worship is good because it represents people's best efforts to reach out towards their Creator, and to make a response to His love. Ministry at the Natural Level. If we worship on the natural level, we will also conduct all our ministry, both inside and outside the church, on the natural level. Evangelism, for instance, will be organized with committees, analysis of trends, development plans, highly organized campaigns, fund drives, and set methods of evangelism. We will memorize “four-things-that-everyone-needs-to-know-for-salvation,” complete with Bible verses for every situation. Or we will organize a gigantic clothing or food distribution plan. We will study psychology so that we can “understand people.” Our personal and public ministry will be based on our ability, training, and experience. We can use all kinds of modern equipment, modern methods of communication and advertising. We can build up a large and successful organization, and have an effective and influential ministry. Ministry on this level can bring people to belief in Christ, to conversion, baptism, and church membership. But people will not know the higher realms of spiritual worship and walking in the Spirit. Worship at  the Spiritual Level. The second level, represented by the Holy Place in the Tabernacle, is the level of spiritual worship and walking in the Spirit. Jesus said that God is a Spirit, and that He wants His people to worship Him in Spirit and truth. Worship in the Spirit is usually done, at least initially, in small prayer fellowships, following a free form determined by the Spirit, and conforming to the principles outlined by Paul in 1 Corinthians 14 (see especially vs.. 26-33). The order of spiritual worship will exhibit endless variety. Spiritual worship is characterized by singing in the Spirit, with psalms and spiritual songs, the melodies and words being given by the Spirit. No one person stands in front to control and lead, but all the members participate freely as the Spirit leads them. Ministry is by the gifts of the Spirit, by which the Lord speaks directly to His people. Teaching is given by inspiration of the Spirit, through people who are yielded to Him. When people have experienced worship in the Spirit, the more formal types of worship will attain new meaning. The Sacraments will be infused with new meaning. They will be seen to be supernatural, powerful, and exciting. In spiritual worship, all can participate as they yield to the Spirit. All are one and all are equal before Him. Their different functions all supplement one another. The Spirit of Jesus is our real Teacher and Leader. In prayer fellowships, all meet together in a family atmosphere, deeply aware of the closeness of their fellowship with their Lord and one with the other. They care deeply for one another, and minister one to the other in the love of Jesus. They do not know one another after the flesh, but after the Spirit.  As they gather frequently (preferably on a daily basis) around the Table of the Lord to receive His spiritual food, they are built up into one Body in Him and filled with His love and His joy. Ideally, the liturgical and charismatic types of worship can be combined to the benefit of both elements. Spiritual worship is highly acceptable to God, because He seeks those who will yield themselves to His Spirit and worship Him in the Spirit. Ministry at the Spiritual Level. If we have begun to worship in the Spirit, we will also conduct our ministry, both inside and outside the church, on the spiritual level. We will not need the methods of men, and we will put less emphasis on modern equipment and skills, knowing that the most important equipment for spiritual ministry is the love of Jesus in our hearts and His Spirit guiding us. The gifts of the Spirit will replace psychological understanding. We will know people after the Spirit, and the secrets of men's hearts and their deepest needs will be revealed to us by the Spirit. We will counsel people, not according to our wisdom and experience, but by a higher knowledge and wisdom of the Spirit, which He gives to us at the moment of ministry. Often we will seem to have no plan or system. We will just go where the Lord sends us, and say what He gives us to say, not planning our words ahead of time. We will be amazed at how exactly His words meet the needs of the ones to whom we minister. We will probably not become the head of a large organization, and may hardly have organization in the conventional sense. We will know that Jesus is the Head, and we are all members, each of whom does his own task in complete obedience to the Head. We will probably not be exalted by men, and may be persecuted and scoffed at. We will decrease, and Jesus will become all in all. We will be less and less seen by men, but the glory of Jesus will be manifest wherever we go. As we worship and minister in the Spirit, we can help others enter into the life in the Spirit, where we can walk together in the Spirit day by day and moment by moment. The Spirit will baptize us all into one Body. The ministry gifts will work together to build up this Body and to bring Christ's Church on to maturity in Him. Beginning with the day of Pentecost, God brought His Church into the realm of spiritual worship and ministry. But as time went on, the ways of men began to creep in and the churches almost universally came back into the courtyard. Having begun in the Spirit, they came back to the level of human effort. At the beginning of this century there was a new breakthrough into the Holy Place. The Pentecostal movement began again to experience worship and ministry in the Spirit. But eventually the Pentecostal churches became organized and their worship fell again into patterns established by men. They had some glorious moments in the Holy Place, but by now have almost universally returned to the courtyard. But actually the Lord has a very different plan at present. He wants His people to get back into the Holy Place, not so that they can stay there, but because He wants them to move on from there to a new level of worship and ministry that has rarely been experienced. God's people must be perfected before His coming and reign. He will come back for a glorious Church, without spot or wrinkle. Worship at the Perfect Level. It may seem strange that we would speak of a perfect level of worship and ministry, but this is precisely what God wants to achieve in and through His Church at this time. Sometime in the not so distant future, Christ is coming for a mature, perfected Bride, who has proclaimed the Gospel unto the ends of the earth and is ready to be presented to Him a “glorious Church, without spot or wrinkle” (Ephesians 5:27). So this third level, represented by the Most Holy Place in the Tabernacle, is the level of Christ's perfection in His Church. As we learn to worship at this level, we will enter fully into His rest. In the Most Holy Place, no thoughts, plans, or emotions of men can enter. There is a complete resting in Him. All burdens and all earthly voices are excluded. We may feel empty or seem not to be doing anything at all. Or we may be caught up with all our being, rejoicing with the angels in the heavenly worship before the throne of God. Self is forgotten and we gaze in wonder at Him and His beauty. We see Him face to face, looking upon His glory with unveiled face. We talk with Him and He with us. He shares openly the secrets of His heart and His mind. We begin to know the secrets of His eternity, to know Him as He knows us. Before His throne, in His Holy of Holies, there is a perfect union with Him and with each other. There will no longer be any slipping or falling or drifting. For we have seen the King in His beauty, and we have become one with Him. This type of worship is perfect before God, and is the greatest desire of His heart. Ministry at the Perfect Level. When we have entered into this perfect worship before the Throne of God's glory, we will begin to manifest the Christ-life fully. As Moses' face shone coming down the mountain, so our lives will have a glow or radiance. Gentiles will come to our light and kings to the brightness of our rising. We will not have to go looking for people to minister to, because the Light of Christ will draw them. We need not fear the darkness or the powers of darkness, because the light will dispel them. The Lord will reveal to us the secrets of His heart and of His plan for these days. For this reason, we will act and minister with assurance, in perfect obedience to His will. Our understanding will be as His understanding, our ministry as His ministry, our suffering as His suffering. As we become fully obedient, the Lord will commit His unlimited power to us and we will see the “greater works” that He has promised. People and nations will bow before the Christ being manifest through us. He will use us to bring justice and judgment on the earth. The glory of the Gospel of His kingdom will be preached throughout the world to every creature. God's judgments will be poured out upon the earth, and the King will come to reign. As we learn to worship and minister on this highest plane, we will be able to bring people to maturity in their Christian lives. God's Church will be perfected and prepared for His coming. This level of worship and ministry is in accordance with the perfect will of God, because it enters into His presence and prepares His glorious Church as His Bride, to live with Him and worship around His throne forever. At this time, God is calling out a chosen people, a royal priesthood, who are willing to enter into His Holy of Holies. When some have entered in and begun to experience this heavenly worship, they can minister to others and bring all God's people into this place of perfection. But there is only one way to enter in. One cannot take a helicopter and come down through the top of the Holy of Holies, nor dig a hole and come in from the back. That way is instant death. We must go in by the door, pass through sacrifice, death and rebirth in the courtyard, and accustom ourselves to spiritual worship and ministry in the Holy Place. From there and there only, we can enter into the Most Holy Place through the veil. On the day of atonement, the altar of incense, which represents our spiritual worship, was brought from its place in the Holy Place, to a new place behind the veil in the Holy of Holies. Then the High Priest could enter in to minister in the Holy of Holies. In like manner, our spiritual worship can bring us into the higher realm behind the veil, where that which is in part can be made whole, and the imperfect be made perfect. At that moment of entrance, there will be a transformation in which the smoke arising from the altar of incense will be lost in the blinding light of God's glory. Our praise and worship will be raised into a new realm. At the time that the High Priest entered behind the veil, no one was allowed to stay in the Holy Place. This means that, when God begins to lead His people on to perfection, those who are not prepared or willing to enter in will have to return to the courtyard. We cannot stay in the Holy Place at the level of worship in the Spirit. This is a time of decision. God calls us to go on to perfection, entering into the highest realm of worship and ministry, or to go back to the natural or soul level. This explains why so many churches have gone back from spiritual to natural worship. God showed them the Promised Land, but they had not the faith to enter in. At the beginning of this century and again in the charismatic movement in the 1960's, many entered into the Holy Place. Actually God wanted them to go on to maturity and enter the Holy of Holies. But through fear, ignorance or lack of faith, many have turned back again to the courtyard and the ways of men and the effort of the soul. God wants us now to prepare our hearts and our lives through spiritual worship and ministry. He wants us to believe and expect and long for the day when our spiritual worship will be brought to the new realms of the Holy of Holies, behind the veil, in the presence of the Living God. Now is the time for God's armies to march, with the priests going before bearing the Ark of the Covenant. Jesus, our Commander, goes before us leading the way into the Promised Land. "Be not conformed to this world; but be transformed by the renewing of your mind; that you may prove what is that good, acceptable, and perfect will of God." Romans 12:2 The Rev. Edwin B. Stube Edwin Stube was born in New Jersey in 1922, educated at Exeter, Williams College, the New England Conservatory of Music, and the Episcopal Theological School in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He served as instructor in music at Williams College, Williamstown, Massachusetts, from 1946 to 1950, and as organist and choir master in several churches in the New England area between 1946 and 1955. In 1957, he was ordained to the priesthood of the Episcopal church and served as curate of St. James' Church, Bozeman, Montana, chaplain to  Episcopal students at the Montana State University and priest-in-charge of Gethsemane Mission in Manhattan, Montana. From 1960 to 1965, he served as Vicar of St. Matthew's Church, Glendive, Montana. From January 1965 until May 1977 he did Christian missionary work in Indonesia. Father Stube and several young Indonesians founded The Holy Way Community in Lawang, East Java. Their primary emphasis is in training young people for evangelism and church planting. Since the  Stube family returned to the States, graduates from the Lawang Bible Training Center have founded Training Centers on several other islands. Father Stube “retired,” living in Baltimore, Maryland. where he served as organist, choirmaster, and priest associate at St. Andrew's Church in Baltimore, and as executive director of The Holy Way in the United States until his death, February 16, 2001. He is survived by a great number of children and grandchildren.

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