The Sign Of The Burial Cloth

Luz Cintron

Dec 8, 2004

Dear Friends,

Once again, I am stirred and sense a call from the Lord for a "dying" to ourselves. I believe the Lord has been sending this message in vivid clarity for this season in order to identify in the miracle and purpose of His birth. dk

While I was in my prayer time as I was singing and praying a song "Anoint my heart for burial" His most Holy Spirit spoke to my heart and here are the words of that song:

Anoint My Heart For Burial The tree of myrrh is full of tears That only comes forth when bruised But the fragrant life that wounding brings Is born on the wings of good news. Like myrrh when hardened must be crushed Before the fragrance can rise My blinded heart must be made dust So, Father, open my eyes… Anoint my heart for burial… That I may walk in true life Anoint my heart for burial… Release the fragrance of Christ… Lord fill me with thy blessed myrrh Lord use me then fill me with myrrh Anoint me with oil Lord take my wounded heart and make A fragrance out of the pain I give my life a sacrifice Bring fruit from this harvest of pain So anoint my heart for burial That I may walk in true life Anoint my heart for burial release the fragrance of Christ Lord fill me with thy blessed myrrh Oh Lord used me then fill me with myrrh Anoint me with oil.

As I was praying those words to Him for myself and for the fellowship of His saints. I felt His Most Holy Spirit speak into my heart: "As the generation who confronted Jesus, the generation of the Pharisees asked for a sign, so this generation has come to ask for a sign before stepping forward to lay down their lives and embrace their cross. But as in those days, no sign was given to them but the sign of Jonah, so it is that no sign will be given to His bride, but the sign of the cloth of burial."

Oh fellow believer, we have fasted and we have prayed for revival, and longed for it , and waited to see the manifestation of His glory and power. It has become a hope for vindication before those who don't believe that they may come to see the reason of our faith and be convicted and be saved. But I understand now where is our sin before my Lord, we have expected that revival as something that will descend upon us from up high. So in this way, the religious people in Israel in Christ times, waited for their Messiah and they missed their visitation.

In hoping like that, His bride has forgotten her only purpose which is to serve. We have forsaken our duty to be salt of this earth and no sign will be given us but the sign of the burial cloth, for if we do not put it on and go down in the grave with Jesus we shall not be raised and there will be no life breathed upon us and we shall remain dead in our trespasses which is our own ignorance.

What is alive can not be revived. Only that which is dead can be brought into life and as we cling to the life in our flesh we end refusing the life offered us, which is from the Spirit of God, of which Jesus spoke referring to it, as the more abundant life. For the one who still seeks for himself has not died and is serving himself in all he does, but the one dead cannot be moved from his position of servant to the body of believers and to this world unto which his whole life is called to become a testimony of God's love and provision through Jesus Christ.

What is different in our cities, in our neighborhoods because of the faith given us? What has changed in the places were we go to work, where we go to study, because of our faith? How have we lived before unbelievers our trust in Jesus? How have we embraced the pain and the suffering that has touched our lives? Have we shown them there is a higher life, a hope, a purpose given us in Christ? Or do we live just as they do from day to day, shaking our heads and saying "its bad, its bad" and then going our way and minding "our own business"?

We can have no business of our own, if we are tending any other business but our Father's, we better stop. Or don't you know the workplace were we earn our living has been given us, to preach the gospel without words but with our lives? That as Jesus reached out to the lost, the poor, the needy , we are placed there, not to show ourselves better than them, but to reach unto them and give them, of what was freely given to us? How many times have we fed them, sharing our bread with them physically and spiritually? We need to go out of our way to reach them and I mean it in more than one way. We are to go out of our way and stretch ourselves, to bring the gospel of Christ. Unless we die to ourselves this wont happen. It doesn't matter how many missionaries we send out and/or support if we do not become His ambassadors right where we are we have not done it.

Only one who is dead to himself can raise Jesus in his life, can lift Him up as a standard. It takes our own burial to all in us that seeks to be served, it takes the embracing of those things that are painful and we judge "undeserved", so that others in pain may come to see and identify with the hope of glory in us and see His light. We should not seek relief in our agony to the things of the flesh, for if we embrace them receiving everything from the hand of Jesus, His life will spring forth through us. For have you read in Isaiah 53 how He made Himself without any beauty that we should desire Him? Instead He became despised and rejected by men, He chose to embrace grief and suffering for us. And again in Hebrews how He wanted to be a High Priest with whom we all could identify? (Hebrews 2:17-18). Then if we seek honor, acceptance or recognition it is ourselves we serve and follow and not Him. For if, in doing what is right unto the Lord, any praise may come from the lips of unbelievers or from believers, let all go unto Whom it is due, our Lord, who is the One living our lives in us and the pride of the flesh will have no part in us. So if we are despised and rejected let it be a reason to meditate on what He suffered for us and give Him thanks to remind us of the things His love endured for us.

For when the devil thinks that he has put us to nothing, and has secluded us in the grave and closed its gates behind us forever, the resurrection power who raised Christ from the grave will brake forth, setting captives free, and will bring the captivity freely captive (Ephesians 4:8; Psalm 68:18) to the heart of God as His own testimony of His grace and mercy towards mankind. In that day the prey will be taken from the mighty, that will be the day in which our God, will contend with the one who contends with us (Isaiah 49:24-26).

No one and nothing can separate us from the love of Christ not even death, but we must be dead to receive and bear His life and that is revival.