About Art Licursi

As you read through the various Articles and Study Series I've posted in this website, you will note that the topic of my writing always concerns Christ and our living relationship with Him. I thought some may want to know who I am and my point of view.

Every Christian is the product of their life experiences and God's intervention in their lives. I'm just like you if you too are a believer who has received the regenerating "Spirit of life in Christ Jesus."  We thus are recipients of God the Father's grace, love and His literal life, received in the person His Son, Jesus Christ, as "the Spirit of life" (Rom 8:2a, cf., 2Cor 3:17, 1John 4:13). Christ literally indwells our spirit (cf., John 3:6, 1Cor 6:17, Rom 8:16) as our new and eternal life (Col 3:4, Gal 2:20).

I'm a blood bought child of God who has come to appreciate the fruit of Jesus of Nazareth's earthly life, death, burial, and resurrection (cf., 1Cor 15:3-4) as He now is, as "both Lord and Christ" (Act 2:36). The One Son of God Almighty has thereby been made available, in His resurrected spirit form (cf., 2Cor 3:17) to indwell "as many as receive Him," (John 1:12).

Though we each are born of God our Father we most likely differ since we each are different in our creation by the Hand of God, and yet each of us is loved of God "as we are." Thus, we each may come to see and appreciate differing aspects of our relationship with the Lord. He knows our frame and our history - our life's experience; and He meets us where we are. He also knows what particular words mean to each of us, as opposed to another child of God. Thus, He then speaks to us by His Spirit and the Scripture by His indwelling voice, speaking in our language of understanding.

God has become ever larger in my eyes as the years have gone by. I see Him as the fully capable, all loving and all-sufficient Father, demonstrating His loving kindness, mercy and grace to me in the person of His indwelling Son, now as "the Spirit of life" within me.

The writings you find are the result of my being a simple believer, a Christian who is born of God and now still learning to live by the life of Christ that the Father has provided to indwell me as my new life. I seek to have a pragmatic, practical understanding of our walk in Christ (Gal 5:16, 25). I've always sought a kind of experiential knowledge of God that works in my life, as measured by the presence of Him who is my rest and peace in my soul.

His life in us is the issue. It is the life germinating resurrection side of the cross of Christ that actually was and is the Father's goal in giving His Son's life for us. Jesus Christ's life was given not only for us (to shed His blood and die for for our sins), but also after His resurrection He gave His life to us, to be the new life in us. This gives a greater depth or dimension to John 3:16. Yes, He gave His life for us, but also He gave His very life to us. It was necessary that Christ would bear and endure the process of incarnation, to suffer for our sins, and also to die our death as our sinful old self. He then rose from the dead to become the "life-giving spirit" (1Cor 15:45). Christ, now in His spirit-form, can be dispensed into the"spirit of man" (Zech 12:1). His life (Col 3:4) and His "divine nature" (2Pet 1:4) become "one spirit" (1Cor 6:17) with our spirit the very moment of our receiving Christ as our savior.

Now it is for us to "learn Christ" (Eph 4:20), to learn to trust and walk in accord with Christ in us as our life and Lord while we still are on this earth in these bodies of flesh.

I have no formal religious training, but I am God-taught by His Spirit. I've learned by many people whom God has brought across the path of my life, in the form of their writings and sometimes in person. I would guess 80% of my understanding has come through other men and women of God whose shoulders we stand on. About 20% of what I passionately share is by the revelation His Word to me personally, through my study of the His precious Scripture. Thus, I've learned by Him how to simply live in the face of everyday life situations and circumstances; I've come to see Him who "is all" and in "all things" occurring in my life. It was for "revelation" for the saints that Paul prays for repeatedly, as in Eph 1:16-23.... that they might "know" the riches of "the inheritance in the saints" - to know Him in us as the new us. Paul's says His gospel of "the mystery" that "was kept secret since the world began," until it was revealed to Paul by the ascended Christ. We see this in Paul's words here in Col 1:25-28, "the mystery which is Christ in you the hope of glory ...28 whom we preach..."  Thus,  Paul did not preach Christ, but rather Christ in the believer!

There has always been within my spirit, since the day of my salvation, a questioning of the traditional view of things, including the traditional view of Scripture and the most widely accepted view of the Church at large, and as a lifestyle. Interestingly, Jesus often expressed His difference of view from "the Traditions of the Elders," that is the religious men that often prevent men from seeing Christ's view and His indwelling life as to the key for living godly in Christ Jesus. I find that where the masses of Christians are is not necessarily where Christ as "the life" is to be found. The truth of Christ is found in the Scripture, but only as it is combined with "revelation" of the Spirit. The Spirit consistently reveals that Christ in us as our life as our all (John 10:10b "I am come that they might have life…". "Life" here in the Greek is "Zoë", the literal spirit-life of Christ Himself.

"Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me. And ye will not come to me, that ye might have life." John 5:39-40

"It is the spirit that quickeneth (makes alive); the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life." John 6:63

"… for the letter killeth, but the spirit giveth life." 2 Cor. 3:6b

By no means do I claim to have all the answers, but I do know Him in a greater way today than last year. I pray the same for every Christian. We seek to know Him, not about Him. "And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent." John 17:3

I believe the limitless God progressively reveals Himself to those who seek Him, and also to some of us who did not particularly seek Him until He intervened in our lives. After all, apart from God's intervention in our lives we would be hopeless and remain hopeless.

My emphasis is simply for us to see and learn to live by Christ's life within us, as our life. I do not write particularly for the purpose that souls be saved, though the whole gospel should be clearly seen in my writings. Evangelization is His calling for others as God directs them. We each are different members of His multi-membered body, with differing functions. Thus, I cannot judge any other person's walk in Christ as they serve Him in this world.

In these writings I am simply trying to convey, by the limited single dimension of human words, the multi-dimensional truths of the limitless God that He has revealed to me. Thus,  I trust that by these writings the Holy Spirit will reveal to you what He wishes to reveal.

My journey has taken my wife and I through many of the denominations and non-denominational expressions of Him on the earth today. Through it all I've continuously been brought back to Him, the unchanging One Himself, as my all. I'm thankful to God my Father for both the pleasant and unpleasant happenings in my Christian experience, sometimes at the hands of Christians, being sure that "all things are working for the good," because I do desire "to be conformed to this image of His Son" (Rom 8:28-29).

I owe much to the anointed words of many of His saints through whom God has influenced my understanding and walk. Some of these lived hundreds of years ago. Though I acknowledge and appreciate each one of the following listed people, I've learned that these are simply men or women who also are seeking Him, and they also were or are yet in the furnace of purification, just as I am. None of us has arrived or has it all. As I've read their writings, I've learned to eat the meat they have provided and spit out the bones, just as I recommend to you who may read my writings.

Some of the folks from whom I've gleaned some of the riches of God include Watchman Nee, Witness Lee, AB Simpson, AW Tozer, Madame Jean Guyon, RE Fenelon, Michael Molinos, Norman Grubb, Ian Thomas, Warren Litzman, Andrew Murray, Jesse Penn Lewis, EW Bullinger, Charles Baker, Oscar Baker, Alan Naas, Cornelius Stam, Richard Jordan, and many, many others.

There have been several major encounters I've had of the Lord through the experiences of the circumstances and situations of living over more than 53 years as a God-birthed child of God. These have served to form the basis and thrust of what my burden is concerning the Lord, for His body; that all might come to see "the riches of the inheritance in the saints" (Eph1:18).

It was in 1994 I began to see the Scripture "dispensationally" and that has, once and for all, answered virtually all the apparent conflicts and contradictions of Scripture. It certainly helps to heed the Scripture itself to see; to whom, concerning what, and to which dispensation or time a particular Scripture refers. I now see that Scripture can interpret Scripture when we "rightly divide the word of truth" (2Tim2:15).

Let it be known that I do receive the entire inspired, God-breathed, Bible Scripture as for my learning, but I particularly receive the portion Bible Scripture that is written to us and about us today, during today's "dispensation of the grace of God," as being written for me and to me as a re-birthed Child of God and member of "the church, which is the body of Christ."  I no longer take my instruction from Scripture written to other peoples in other dispensations (e.g. Israel), as being to me or for me to follow. The Lord Himself is the same in all Scripture, as He is full of grace, loving us unconditionally, but He has dealt and does deal with Israel and the body of Christ in significantly different ways.

In "rightly dividing the word of truth" (2Tim 2:15) I must first discern to which of the following people is a scripture written "to the Jew" or to " the Greek (Gentile)" or to "the church of God" (1Cor 10:32). This helps me to not take other peoples mail as my own. This heightens the truth that is ours, for us today in the "dispensation of the grace of God" (Eph 3:2).

You will note from my writing that I often reference the Apostle Paul as he spoke of himself, "THE Apostle to the Gentiles" (Rom 11:13, 15:16) for this day of the "dispensation of the grace of God" (Eph 3:2, Rom 16:25) in which we may enjoy the fruit of "the mystery (Gk., musterion, secret) hidden from ages and generations" (Col 1:26), which is "Christ in you the hope of glory" (Col 1:27), "Whom we preach…" (Col 1:28a)

As we consider some of these Pauline statements we must conclude that the Apostle Paul was either a boaster or he was in fact the Moses of "the dispensation of the grace of God." If any man think himself to be a prophet, or spiritual, let him acknowledge that the things that I (Paul) write unto you are the commandments of the Lord." (1 Cor. 14:37)

As result of these and several other significant events and realizations, I today am reduced to a very simple gospel and one doctrine pertaining to Christian living - Christ Himself, alive in the believer as the believer's genuine life. No doubt you will often see these words, "In Christ," "in Him," "Christ in," "indwelling Christ," more than any other words or phrases in my writings. These are used, as written here or in a similar fashion, more than 200 times in Scripture. Christ is all I desire to know, and frankly all I care to learn to know by experience… for "Christ is all and in all" (Col 3:11). I trust that He has and will lead me in all my doings.

May the Lord richly bless you as a grace believer with the divine revelation of "Christ in you," as your all-sufficient life. I pray the words you read on this website will be anointed of His Spirit in the revelation of Him who is given to be your life.

"Now to him that is of power to stablish you according to my (Paul's) gospel, and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery, which was kept secret since the world began," Romans 16:25