Luke’s Gospel reports that the Lord and His well-trained twelve engaged in spiritual warfare doing masterful ministry work in the Miracle Realm. Then, the Seventy…

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OVERCOMING DEAD TRADITION

One can believe what one will concerning what they think Christianity actually is or is supposed to be but the vast majority of Christians usually revert to their traditional modes of both belief and practice whenever the Lord may apply an extra degree of persuasion toward a higher level of ministry and the necessity of obeying His Word. Why He does this should be obvious since it involves the practice of actual real ministry as illustrated quite clearly in the written gospels. But many Christians are only familiar with such ministry in mere abstract form in that a few might actually read the Scriptural accounts of Miracle Realm happenings but pretty much never see such happenings in their own Christian circles.

Many also rarely or never see their own chosen Christian leaders performing in such a way and know next to no one who does. This raises the question of why such rejection of real ministry exists in the first place though it apparently often involves the fear of breaking church protocol, being perceived as a weirdo by Christian peers, or simply causing a general sense of discomfort (conviction?) among one’s social group.

It is also likely the case that most Christians believe the powerful ministry of the Lord and His twelve apostles was only meant to be ministered by the Lord and his twelve apostles and no one else ever again. In this we rightly place the Lord Jesus way up high as our Great Spiritual Warrior who could kick the devil’s backside all over Creation and defeat every other enemy in His path toward reaching the people whom He loves and who have great faith in Him and who need real ministry which includes every need of any kind whether outside or inside the Miracle Realm. It is good that many Christians, though very likely not a majority, do not see the gospel accounts as mere fantasy or made up stories. Such Christians actually believe the accounts are real and reflect actual historical events. Yet how many of these same Christians believe the Lord when He claims the same power which He possesses can be given to and practiced by whosoever will? Did not the twelve apostles prove this?

Yet, what has transpired in this regard is that the twelve apostles have been transformed (in the thinking of most within traditional Christianity, especially by many Christian controllers) into some form of ultra-human demigods as the mighty Titans of Greek Mythology throwing lightning bolts and whatnot. However, the Scriptures are very clear that the Lord purposely chose practical unpretentious hard-working men essentially like everybody else who struggled with life like everybody else and continually proved their humanity like everybody else pretty much every day and even in the early going after dropping their nets and exiting tax booths. They were just people no different than you or I. They were not special in any greater way but were chosen primarily because they BELIEVED IN THE LORD JESUS and He knew that about them. He knew they were teachable. He knew they would trust Him. And He knew He would be able to work with them and through them to extend His ministry.

Therefore, the original twelve apostles were men who, regardless of their shortcomings, personal foibles, sins, past failures, wrong choices, and likely even a feeling of inherent disappointment in themselves, somehow still had the desire to please God. They wanted to be right with God. They somehow knew such a thing was possible. And even though they had at the time done their best to achieve such but felt like they never got there, still believed it was possible and still had the desire to keep trying. This made them spiritually hungry. It also made them potentially faithful. And the Lord noticed…

This is why there is no excuse for any Christian anywhere not walking in the same Miracle Realm and doing as the apostles did to varying degrees and why the vaulting up of the twelve into demigod status is not only grossly wrong but also gross sin. The whole point in one sense is the Lord showing what He can do by raising up pretty much anyone to train for His work and get them out there doing it which proves He can elevate weak-minded temptation-prone spiritually fruitless struggling sinners (anyone and everyone) from the general low level of fallen humanity ruled by evil forces into fully trained Spirit-filled anointed witnesses and effective workers in His kingdom with authority over the enemy and even over the so-called laws of nature.

This does not make such people the stuff of myths and legends but born-again human beings appropriating their original spiritual nature possessed before the fall.

THE SEVENTY

We learn of the Seventy in Luke Chapter 10. Like the twelve, the Seventy were an additional large group of the Lord’s disciples apparently specially chosen by Him for the exact Miracle Realm ministry. This immediately dispels the notion once again that such ministry was only for the Lord and His twelve. It is here that we see what is effectively, for the purposes of this teaching, a third level of direct ministry participation. The Lord is obviously first, the twelve were second since He needed a relatively small core group to act as His initial elders and first ambassadors into the world—a foundation. The third level, then, is everybody else. As you read the following account picture the members of this large group and how excited and overjoyed they must have been to be counted worthy of being sent into the world as viable ministers of the Gospel just as important as anyone else with a distinct ministry to perform according to the will of God (rather than simply being as so many faceless members of the religious crowd, many of whom are stashed away on pews, rarely ever doing all that much or anything at all in the Lord’s Miracle Realm):

Now after this the Lord appointed seventy others, and sent them in pairs ahead of Him to every city and place where He Himself was going to come.

And He was saying to them, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; therefore beseech the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into His harvest. Go; behold, I send you out as lambs in the midst of wolves. Carry no money belt, no bag, no shoes; and greet no one on the way. Whatever house you enter, first say, ‘Peace be to this house.’ If a man of peace is there, your peace will rest on him; but if not, it will return to you. Stay in that house, eating and drinking what they give you; for the laborer is worthy of his wages. Do not keep moving from house to house. Whatever city you enter and they receive you, eat what is set before you; and heal those in it who are sick, and say to them, ‘The kingdom of God has come near to you.’”

“But whatever city you enter and they do not receive you, go out into its streets and say, ‘Even the dust of your city which clings to our feet we wipe off in protest against you; yet be sure of this, that the kingdom of God has come near.’ I say to you, it will be more tolerable in that day for Sodom than for that city.” [Luke 10:1-12][1]

© 2025 by RJ Dawson. All Rights Reserved.

[1] Unless otherwise noted all Scriptures are taken from the New American Standard Bible, © 1960, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission.