The Letter to Ephesus including Repentance Prayer to Return to First Love of Christ

Have you left your first love for the Lord Jesus Christ? The Church at Ephesus was commended for its faithfulness in many areas of life and ministry, and yet they had missed the most fundamental commandment: to love the Lord with all their hearts, mind, soul, and strength. The letter to Ephesus challenges believers to honestly evaluate their motivations and priorities to ensure that Jesus truly has first place in all things.

Return to Your First Love

Do not fall into the trap of idolatry or the traps that the Churches mentioned in the Book of Revelation fell into. These letters are written to warn us.

Revelation 2:1-3 (AMP) “To the angel (divine messenger) of the church in Ephesus write: “These are the words of the One who holds [firmly] the seven stars [which are the angels or messengers of the seven churches] in His right hand, the One who walks among the seven golden lampstands (the seven churches): ‘I know your deeds and your toil, and your patient endurance, and that you cannot tolerate those who are evil, and have tested and critically appraised those who call themselves apostles (special messengers, personally chosen representatives, of Christ), and [in fact] are not, and have found them to be liars and impostors; and [I know that] you [who believe] are enduring patiently and are bearing up for My name’s sake, and that you have not grown weary [of being faithful to the truth].

This letter is about all of us personally. It's written for all of us. It is for every Christian in their own personal walk.

We are all one in Christ, baptized by one Spirit into one Body.

There are many Christians that have divisive spirits who don't understand the unity that is in Christ Jesus.

You need to understand that this letter is written to you as an individual. Take it personally.

Have a look at your own motives.

The enemy will test you to see what is in your hearts. By God's grace, may you be found to be faithful.

Even if you are faithful, it will be by the grace of God and the power of the Holy Spirit.

Don't take credit for anything because it is all from the Lord.

You cannot take credit for anything. You can't even take credit for you, yourself. You were wonderfully created by the Lord. He owns you now. He bought you with His precious blood.

Be careful that you do not become self-righteous about your own achievements or works, try to earn brownie points, or even become too busy doing the Lord's work that you forget the true purpose behind what you are doing.

The most important thing is the Lord, having Him and His Word in your heart, and loving Him.

You can end up loving the Letter rather than loving Christ Jesus.

If you prioritize Law over Grace, you'll receive another Jesus and another gospel, which is a false religion, led by another spirit.

False religion leads to a spirit of unrighteous judgment and produces dead works.

If you produce dead works, the Lord warned that He would remove your lampstand from out of its place. You do not want to be in a body with no lampstand. That would be a great tragedy because it would mean that you're worshiping in a false religion.

The lampstands are the seven spirits of God and the Holy Spirit. They also represent Jesus and the Tree of Life.

It's literally His life and His Spirit. There is a possibility that He will come and remove His Spirit. Then you would become a dead Church.

No one wants to be a dead Church.

The first commandment is to love God with all your heart, mind, strength, and soul.

When I first came to the Lord, and He revealed himself to me, I was in awe. Absolute awe. I understood the saying, "I once was lost, but now I'm found". I was pulled in to the Lord's arms and it was amazing. Each person's experience with the Lord varies, but that must be what we return to: that first love.

When you have that love, you are going to love the truth. But, if you don't have that love, then you are not going to love the truth.

The random person that we pass on the side of the road represents Christ. When you walk past that person, you're actually walking past Jesus because He said, "What you do to the least, you do to me".

In the story of the Good Samaritan, the religious people, represented by the priest and the Levite just walked past Jesus on the way to their religious temple. Their religion had become an idol.

You must search your own heart and look at the true motives behind your behavior.

Why are you here?

You are here for one reason.

To know more about Jesus. To love Him and worship Him in Spirit and in truth.

You are not here to lift up anyone else.

You are here to lift up Jesus. It is all about Him.

Don't look at any one in ministry, except to know that God is using them as a vessel to pour out His Spirit.

Ideally that is what you want as well, to become a vessel that the Lord can use to pour out His glory.

You find that by loving the truth and by loving Him.

That's how you overcome. By loving the truth.

It's really so simple that many miss it, coming under unnecessary rules and regulations.

We once did a deliverance on a particular man, on whom God had a massive calling on his life. His calling was huge. We sat down to pray with him after talking with him for a while. As we began to pray for him, demons began to manifest wildly. He had many different types of demons. They bound him up, paralyzing him as if he was in a straight jacket. He got a bit of deliverance, but we couldn't get the big ones out. In that experience, the Lord showed me that it is all by faith.

Demons come out by faith. It is not about knowledge. It is about loving Jesus and loving the truth.

If you have faith in Christ, then you are going to receive His grace.

However, if you don't trust Him, and you're hanging on to fear, then you are not trusting the Lord.

That is not love.

Another man that I ministered to had fear and trauma. I told him, "Listen to the teaching on trauma first, but to prepare for your deliverance all you need to do is love Jesus. Love Him and love the truth".

It's just that simple.

God will do the rest.

Do not get anxious thinking that you've got to learn certain words or techniques.

No, all you have to do is love Jesus.

He is your righteousness.

Deliverance is by faith.

If I'd said to that man, "You've got to do this, this, this and that in order to get your deliverance.", that could fall into works. If I'd told him in order to overcome a spirit of fear that he needed to learn certain scriptures, I would have missed an opportunity to share the truth.

What casts out fear?

Perfect love.

Perfect love casts out fear.

What is that love?

That love is loving Christ. It's love of the truth. He is the truth.

Jesus is the fulfillment of the Law.

When you love Jesus, then you will overcome fear.

You will also overcome the enemy, because then you are on the right path.

What will happen is that you will love the truth.

What sets you free?

The truth sets you free.

It is not about works. It's through grace and grace comes by faith.

Faith works by love.

Love is the fulfillment of the Law.

If you become religious with all your ministry work and put those things before Christ, you are in danger. That's like putting the cart before the horse, so to speak.

You must put Christ first.

He is the head.

You must have Him as the head of your life and love Him first.

It's simple.

Just love Him.

When you love Him, then everything else will fall into place.

If, on the other hand, you are running to man for deliverance, going from one deliverance ministry to the next, and chasing after those things, then you've got it all wrong.

That's actually dangerous.

It's the Word that sets you free.

Who is the Word?

Jesus is the Word.

Do you love the Word? Do you love Jesus?

If you do, then He will deliver you.

When you look at a new Christian who doesn't know anything about Christ, then you can see that God's grace is amazing.

When you were a new baby in Christ, did you have to do anything?

When I was a brand new believer I didn't know anything at all about the Word of God, but I saw God's power and authority around me. I saw demons tremble around me because of God's presence.

Why did I see that?

It wasn't because I knew the Word, scriptures, or was following the Letter of the Law.

It was because I knew the Spirit. I knew Christ.

It was by faith because I trusted Him.

I loved Him because He came into my heart.

That's what it is all about.

It is love that breaks every yoke. That anointing is love.

Love breaks the yoke.

There was another man I was ministering to with Schizophrenia. He was also going to a different ministry for help. That ministry had him on a daily program.

It was a works-based program, not Christ.

I told him that he could do those works as long as he loved Jesus.

The core of the program was good, but the way that he was having to do it was in a works-based mentality. It wasn't Christ. It wasn't love.

He was being led to work things out himself instead of resting in Christ.

We are the Bride of Christ. If we're the Bride of Christ, and He is our husband and head. We are called to submit to Him like the wife is called to submit to her husband, then why would we ever have to worry about anything?

He is God.

As His Bride, we are called to be faithful to Him.

You have to be faithful in everything.

You have to get that perspective that you are His Bride.

It may be more difficult for men to think of being the Bride of Christ, but the Holy Spirit can give you a revelation of that.

The Holy Spirit will give you a revelation of who you are in Christ. You are His Church.

He loves you unconditionally.

Will you be unfaithful to Him?

Will you be a harlot bride?

That is what the enemy wants you to be.

If you are following your flesh, then you will be a harlot.

Harlotry is being led by your flesh.

So, how do you get led by the Spirit?

Again, it is so simple.

Just love Jesus.

Love Him as your savior. Love Him as your spiritual husband. Love Him as your head.

Allow His Spirit to guide and lead you.

Everyone gets tempted by sin.

What happens when you are tempted by sin? What happens when the lust of the flesh comes?

What did Jesus say that you should do?

Pray that you don't fall into temptation.

Would you rather give into sin rather than pray that you overcome sin?

Do you love Jesus more than the pleasure of that tempting sin, whatever it is?

When you overcome temptation and sin to a degree, then it won't have a stronghold on your life anymore.

Sin will become weak and won't have dominion over you anymore.

But, there is a testing.

Overcoming sin in your life does require suffering. You might want to do this or that, but will deny yourself those pleasures because you choose not to feed your flesh.

Who are you going to build up, your spirit man or your carnal man?

Following Jesus will require a sacrifice on your part.

Revelation 2:4-7 (AMP) But I have this [charge] against you, that you have left your first love [you have lost the depth of love that you first had for Me]. So remember the heights from which you have fallen, and repent [change your inner self—your old way of thinking, your sinful behavior—seek God’s will] and do the works you did at first [when you first knew Me]; otherwise, I will visit you and remove your lampstand (the church, its impact) from its place—unless you repent. Yet you have this [to your credit], that you hate the works and corrupt teachings of the Nicolaitans [that mislead and delude the people], which I also hate. He who has an ear, let him hear and heed what the Spirit says to the churches. To him who overcomes [the world through believing that Jesus is the Son of God], I will grant [the privilege] to eat [the fruit] from the tree of life, which is in the Paradise of God.’

There is a falling when you leave your first love for Christ.

This Church at Ephesus had done an awesome work.

They'd been patient. They endured. They did not tolerate evil.

They called out false apostles, messengers of Satan, liars, and impostors.

They did this all for the sake of the Lord and were faithful to the truth without growing weary.

What we can learn from this passage of scripture is that you can be faithful and have a form of godliness, but still have the Lord make a charge against you!

To leave your first love is sinful behavior.

It is idolatry.

Doing good works can become idolatrous if you put those things before the Lord.

You can be not growing weary, praising God with all your heart, and be falling the whole time because you've neglected the simplicity that is in Christ Jesus.

Also be careful of letting things become too habitual in your walk with the Lord.

You can have a habitual religion that becomes repetitive.

Testimony of Deliverance from Spiritually Plugged Ears

We did a deliverance on a girl where the enemy had spiritually blocked her ears.

She was an awesome Christian, but she was slowly being led astray.

She said that it was weird, that she didn't even feel like praying, and that her love for the Lord was departing.

She had a massive deliverance.

When we discerned that her ears had been plugged up and prayed for her, she had a powerful deliverance. The demons screamed when they were cast out of her.

The enemy had sabotaged her ears!

You need to pray that God unstop your ears because what the enemy does is try to stop you from hearing the Spirit of God.

That is what had happened to this woman.

Literally, we can allow the enemy to remove the lampstand from our lives by stopping us from hearing what the Spirit is saying and eventually snuff us out.

That's what they want to do.

Repentance Prayer to Return to Your First Love of Christ

Lord, we thank you for the Holy Spirit. We thank you for your lampstand. We thank you for your blessing, and for your provision for each and every one of us.

Thank you for speaking to each one of us individually, Lord.

We ask that you open our spiritual eyes and ears if we have become blind and dull of hearing.

Lord, we come to you right now and repent for making anything that we've done in your name, habitual or repetitive, and not out of love.

Lord, we repent for not putting you before all things.

Lord, right now we acknowledge you as our first love, like when we first beheld you.

Father, we thank you and return to our first love for you like a honeymoon.

We return to you, Lord with eyes of adoration.

It is all about you and the simplicity that is in Christ, Lord.

Because love is the fulfillment of the Law.

We acknowledge that you are our righteousness, Lord and it's the love of the truth.

Lord, we ask you to forgive us, Father God for where we have gone astray and haven't followed you in perfect love.

We repent for missing things and not having eyes to see and being blinded.

We ask you to remove the scales from our eyes, Lord.

We also ask that you remove everything from our ears so that we can hear you, Lord.

We ask you to cover the shame of our nakedness, Lord.

We ask you for gold refined in the fire.

We ask you for eye salve that we may see, Lord.

We ask you for eyes to see and ears to hear what the Spirit of the Lord is saying to each and every one of us.

We ask you to clothe us, Lord with the awesome garment of your righteousness and your love.

We pray for the armor of your love.

We thank you for the anointing that breaks every yoke. We ask for your love that breaks every yoke.

We ask for your powerful Holy Spirit to shake, break, and destroy the chains that the enemy would try to wrap us in through our own personal intentions instead of saying, "Your will be done".

God, we ask that you remove us from all evil and all temptation.

Lord, we thank you that you restore in us a right heart: a true and contrite heart.

We thank you Lord that your Word says, "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for they shall inherit the kingdom.

We ask that you help us to empty ourselves of self, Lord.

Lord, we ask that you help us to truly follow you.

We ask that you help us to hold you in our hearts first and foremost, above all other things.

In Jesus's name.

Lord, we pray that we can hear your voice. For those that cannot, we ask that we would learn to hear you and for those that can that we would hear it more prevalently.

God, we cannot afford to miss you so we ask that you do whatever you have to do to get us in line. Do it!

Father, we pray that you would cut out anything in us that is not of you, in Jesus's name.

Amen.

Father, we ask that your Holy Spirit would fill everyone today, Lord.

We ask that our gift of discernment would be amplified every day that we can see more truth and hear more truth.

In Jesus's name.

Amen.

Father, right now in the name of Jesus, we cut off all astral projection in Jesus's name.

We cut off Lucifer, Baphomet, and Horus, and every watcher devil. We cut you off Satan, right now in Jesus's name.

We thank you Father God that you anoint us in Jesus's name that we can all come into true love and true relationship with our ears and our eyes wide open in Jesus's name.

We ask that you remove the scales, remove, the plugs, and remove the blockers and anything else that would stop us from hearing and clearly discerning the voice of the Spirit.

We ask that you give us all ears to hear and eyes to see in Jesus's name.

Amen.