In the beginning, God created everything and said it was "good", meaning it
was exactly what he wanted to create, and had no flaws in that regard.
Humanly speaking, what God created followed the blueprint exactly.
Man, having a mind of his own, made the choice to try and do something
that
was outside the design of himself.
By doing this, man created a distance between himself and his function
with
God. Man sinned.
Going outside of the design of God is called apostasy, and apostasy is an
ever growing, ever widening and ever advancing and ever dividing departure
from his own purpose in the plan and design of God.
Eventually, God gave to Moses what man's departure consisted of in ten
violations known as the Ten Commandments. The Ten Commandments, or law,
were given to man to impose a forced control at the penalty of death. Man
was as a wild animal; never conforming to his created purpose, but always
against it. God came against man's new unnatural and discordant behavior
in giving him the law to restrain him.
The law is never given to people of promise, but to people of no promise.
This is revealed in 1Timothy, chapter 1.
1 Timothy 1:9 Knowing this, that the law is not made for a righteous man,
but for the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and for sinners, for
unholy and profane, for murderers of fathers and murderers of mothers, for
manslayers,
I Timothy 1:10 For whoremongers, for them that defile themselves with
mankind, for menstealers, for liars, for perjured persons, and if there be
any other thing that is contrary to sound doctrine
We see that the law is only given to sinners, not to people who can
improve
their sinfulness.
Forest rangers do not nail up a sign saying "Do Not Feed The Bears" where
no
bears exist. There needs to be a purpose for a law in making the
inconsiderate conform.
As the printed inserts from inspectors we get in items we purchase at the
store, God "inspected" man and gave the results of man's deformity. If a
car on the assembly line has a cracked windshield, the inspector, upon
writing down this defect for correction, has created a law: "Thou Shalt
Not
have a cracked windshield". Nothing about the inspector's findings can be
used to correct the windshield, but rather, has made possible the repair
of
the windshield BY SUBSTITUTIONAL or REPLACEMENT new windshield.
Men who attempt to make themselves better people by the conformity to the
restraints of law, attempt the impossible: They use the evidence of their
malady to promote the evidence of no malady at all. 1Timothy points out
that those who do this don't understand what they are doing, and don't
understand what they are talking about.
1 Timothy 1:5 Now the end of the commandment is charity out of a pure
heart,
and of a good conscience, and of faith unfeigned:
I Timothy 1:6 From which some having swerved have turned aside unto vain
jangling;
I Timothy 1:7 Desiring to be teachers of the law; understanding neither
what
they say, nor whereof they affirm.
Eventually, God became a man named Jesus, born on the earth for the
purpose
of becoming this substitution for man. Jesus became the substitutional
holy, or appropriate and unswerving in purpose of God's design for man,
lifetime that we could never achieve ourselves, Jesus became the death to
please the justice for a man and every man who puts faith in him, in a
death
sentence to please the need for justice of the court of heaven, thirdly,
Jesus became the substitutional inner conscience of man, which is called
the
rebirth: born again.
The ministry of Jesus upon the earth is comprised of two points. The
first
point he gave to man was that if he wanted to go to heaven and escape
eternal punishment, he needed to be perfectly free from sin; if it was
necessary, man needed to cut off his hands or pluck out his eye, for the
purpose of being holy or of appropriate conduct.
This first point of Jesus' two-point earthly sermon was given for effect.
Jesus drew-out the desired affect in his listeners, and next delivered his
second and final point to his earthly ministry: Jesus next said to his
troubled audience that became all men through Scripture throughout
history:
"Blessed [or HAPPY]" are you who mourn, hunger and thirst for
righteousness"; the righteousness needed to go to heaven, "...for I will
be
your substitutional life". One only hungers and thirsts for what he does
not have. This is also what he meant when he said:
Matthew 11:28 Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I
will give your rest.
Rest from the futile effort of producing holiness from our original
resources; our own best efforts.
Jesus said: "He who loses his life for my sake will find it". We who
believe become partakers in the life of Christ.
Not INFLUENCED by the life of Christ, as a side life working together in
Christ, but OF the life of Christ who does every good thing in and through
the person he inhabits.
Christians are known as followers of Christ, but Christians are not in any
way Jesus impersonators. Christians are representation of Jesus by
himself
personally. Christians do not dress up to go and meet with Jesus,
Christians are those who go to Jesus to be dressed and prepared by him for
his purpose in and through those he inhabits. So we see, Jesus is not an
INFLUENCE on the life of the Christian, but is the very life of the
Christian without separation.
One can only hunger and thirst for what one does not have. If one has
food
and water he will not hunger and thirst; if one has no righteousness and
knows it is required of him, he will hunger and thirst for it.
Jesus wanted man to understand that he was not the answer to his dilemma,
but the reason for it; man does not have the ability to improve or conform
to any kind of spirituality, but it is because of the remnants of man's
own
self after being filled with the spirit of Christ, that are the exclusive
resource of his sin. The difficulty with his sin comes from his new
nature
from the rebirth into Christ. This is the undying conscience of Christ
that
lives to guide the believer through the present and through all eternity.
This rebirth is a thing that separates man without God into man with God;
man with no holiness or spiritual good, to a man with God and all
spiritual
good.
Rebirth therefore, becomes the most important asset for man's quest to be
acceptable for heaven.
How then do we gain this rebirth?
John 3:3 Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto
thee,
Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.
Rebirth, as we have seen, is not based on man's ability to conform, but
through the recognition that conformity is impossible for man through his
own depravity of holy resources, but is based on the holiness of an
indwelling Christ.
It is as a man who comes to you with tape across his mouth who writes on
his
tablet that he is a habitual liar, and understands that no liar will ever
enter heaven, so he is restraining himself from ever having opportunity to
lie again with the tape. Further, the man opportunes you that he will pay
you handsomely if you would be interested in watching him 24 hours a day,
making sure that after he eats the tape be reapplied to make sure of no
lies
escaping. The reason this effort for self-imposed holiness will never
work
is because of the sad fact that he is merely a liar with tape on his
mouth.
The tape, which is the representation of LAW, is a restraint of one who is
otherwise uncooperative and untrustable. Definitely NOT heaven material.
The tape, as the law, proves by its existence that the person wearing the
tape is a liar. The law of God proves by its existence that man is a
sinner.
The law of God goes back to that blueprint that I mentioned in the
beginning: The original plan for man, and man's departure from it; the law
is the means from which we see the violation. The tape is a perfect sign
that a man is a liar.
What it is that happens to the liar when he partakes of the Divine Nature,
the Mind of Christ, the Holy Spirit of God, is: He no longer is
comfortable
with lying, for he loves THE TRUTH! This removal of unnecessary tape from
the mouth of a former liar is known as CHRISTIAN LIBERTY. It is like
getting the keys to the car because the owner trusts where you will go and
how you will go with the car. Christian liberty is where the necessity of
law becomes obviously unnecessary. Since Jesus is the life, there is not
possibility of sinful influence, Jesus has the controls of the innermost
man; the conscience of right and wrong. It is what the term: "No longer
under law" refers to, and what "law written in the heart" refers to.
This Christian liberty is mentioned wherever we see we are "not under
law",
and particularly where we read that "all things are permissible". How is
this possible that God who came to earth to die for payment for our sins
would then permit us to do the same things again? It is part of God's
excellent wisdom, in that he made all things common and equal before us.
1Corintians 6:12 All things are lawful unto me, but all things are not
expedient: all things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under
the
power of any.
God crashed the "stock market" of our lusts by taking away the rarity of
what would be special as a result of this rarity. As a result of having
all
things permissible, there no longer exists a delicacy or a craving for
what
we do not have. There no longer is a value system based on "supply and
demand", which always go hand in hand.
Solomon had everything permissible to him, and because of it, he sought
more
and more fiercely for everything and anything he could obtain to satisfy
his
hunger and lusts, only to find it a "meaningless" bore. As the Christian
goes through maturing, in his sin and obedience, he learns progressively
in
his thinking that sin is meaningless. With the mind of Christ within, God
then shows us what things have great meaning indeed, and we naturally seek
these things. It is what the Apostle Paul meant when he said "Behold, all
things are new"
2 Corinthians 5:17 Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new
creature:
old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.
Why is it, how is it, that a born-again Christian, with the mind and the
Divine nature of God within him yet sins?
It is because there are TWO MINDS at work in the Believer, his own, and
Christ's.
This is why Scripture tells us we need the continual renewal of our own
mind
through Jesus' mind.
Romans 12:2 And be not fashioned according to this world: but be ye
transformed by the renewing of your mind, and ye may prove what is the
good
and acceptable and perfect will of God.
Whenever Scripture admonishes us to behave a certain way, it is the
request
that we act like ourselves; our new self that is of the life of Christ.
James 1:23 For if any be a hearer of the word, and not a doer, he is like
unto a man beholding his natural face in a mirror;
James 1:24 For he beholdeth himself, and goeth his way, and straightway
forgetteth what manner of man he was.
This passage is about Christians, for we know by Scripture that the
natural
man without Christ cannot do one right thing.
Romans 3:10 As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one.
The face seen in the mirror is therefore of the one who is in Christ. The
passage makes it clear: When we sin, we behave in a manner unlike
ourselves;
our new selves. When we "be transformed" by the renewing of our minds, it
is part of this process of renewing our minds: The accepting and
respecting
for what we now cannot escape from being true about ourselves anyway.
Admonishment from Scripture concerning our conduct is always a request to
remember who we are in reality; the things we love and cherish and are
inseparably based within now: holy living, and holy life. The
Admonishment
of
Scripture to behave a certain way just saves us the time from finding out
anew that we cannot continue going in the wrong direction without great
discomfort.
The unregenerate, those who are not reborn, find little if any discomfort
in
doing wrong, but are pleased with it, and wish others to join them in
their
error.
The fellowship with the mind of Jesus is where maturity comes from. We do
not, once again, make something better of ourselves, but permit the
unerring
mind of Christ to have its way with our new person, knowing that
Jesus is our actual reality of who we are now.
Should any Christian head into the pirate ship of sin, he will sicken and
jump overboard and swim to shore, without fail. The heart jumps
overboard
to escape first: It actually isn't possible for a Christian to benefit or
profit from sin.
When a Christian sins, he is miserable and uncomfortable in it.
This is a very useful observance in ones self to know if they are saved:
How
do we feel about our sin.
2Corinthians 13:5 Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith; prove
your own selves. Know ye not your own selves, how that Jesus Christ is in
you, except ye be reprobates?
There is an inescapable truth about the proper conduct of our new man in
Christ.
If it were not for the mind of Christ within us, we would have no
understanding, no compass within us to know the difference between right
and
wrong choices.
The ability to sin comes from an imagination that is left behind from the
old nature; the old man. The Apostle Paul stated in Romans that if we do
not like our sin, it is a divine revelation from an indwelling Jesus, and
because we agree with Jesus, and have a conscience about it, it is no
longer
ourselves that is sinning, but sin dwelling in us.
Romans 7:17 Now then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in
me.
Upon first-faith, we were changed instantly and eternally by this rebirth,
having Jesus in us. Through Scripture, we are able to explore this new
creation, as though the Scriptures were a flashlight, and our new man a
seemingly endless cave of beauty and delight. When we explore who we are
in
Christ, it is about Jesus in us.
Because we partake in the life of Christ in our rebirth, we have his
righteousness and his destiny as our own too.
We do not become the eternal God, as Jesus is, but we partake of his life.
We are not indwelt and saved gradually, but our minds gradually come into
better understanding and cooperation.
Ephesians 2:10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto
good
works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.
This verse clearly shows that we are created unto good works. Obviously,
in
our original state we could do no good works, so it refers to our next,
reborn state, to do good works. It is to say that we are REBORN unto good
works, which indicates that one must be indwelt by Christ and SAVED first,
in order to do a good work. It is not progressional or gradual salvation.
When we do sin, we have an advocate in Jesus, to help us get back on
track,
and to forgive us from all unrighteousness.
This sinfulness, though paid for in advance by Jesus Christ, is
detrimental
to our usefulness to God on the earth.
The issue of our eternal salvation was taken care of by Jesus on the
cross.
What the sin of a Christian creates is a waste of time.
The Christian cannot be comfortable with sin, and only enters into it
through forgetfulness or through discouragement. This is why God ordained
fellowship and ministry. Ministry is 100% about the utter protection and
care from God through his promises to us. It is the encouragement needed
to
keep us from behaving other than like our new natures in Christ.
James 1:23 For if any be a hearer of the word, and not a doer, he is like
unto a man beholding his natural face in a mirror:
James 1:24 For he beholdeth himself, and goeth his way, and straightway
forgetteth what manner of man he was.
This is to say that we see ourselves in a mirror and understand whom we
are,
and then go off and forget, and do things that are entirely unlike
ourselves; to sin like the sinners we are not.
A sinner is someone who has no conscience. Christians sin, but feel badly
about their sin by the mind of Christ being his conscience inside himself.
This is what is meant when God said:
John 1:10 If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his
word is not in us.
We are instructed to come boldly to the Throne of Grace so we will not
dwell
in our failure and identify with that, but more to the point to dwell on
Jesus for the good.
Hebrews 4:16 Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace that we
may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need.
How is it we begin to have this rebirth and the new life in Christ?
Jesus said we must become like little children:
Matthew 18:3 And said, Verily I say unto you, Except ye be converted, and
become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven.
What is it that little children possess that we must obtain?: Children
have
an unquestioning FAITH or TRUST, in God.
We are saved through the generosity of God, through Faith in it. Faith,
we
see, has no thought that God will play any tricks on us concerning the
salvation he promises us for simply trusting him on it.
It is a simple and plain, though magnificent, gesture of generosity from
God.
When we seek Jesus for this life in sincerity, he will simply and surely
give it to us. We will be in the life of Christ through all eternity in
heaven by trusting Jesus when he says he wants to and will do it
immediately
for us upon request.
Judgment Day will not be about the judgment of Jesus, but the judgment of
MEN. Did men judge to trust God or not concerning his salvation. God
will
grant the earthly wishes in this regard after death. There is no changing
of the choice after death.
And it must be pointed out, that upon accepting Jesus' choice of us for
salvation, which is extended to everyone, we are saved by that faith, or
trust, alone. We are not saved by any form of our own perceived
accomplishment, but exclusively by the accomplishment of Jesus. We are
not
saved by having a good cooperative life in Christ, but by Christ.
We are saved today upon acceptance, entirely by the generosity of God, in
spite of us, in spite of our sinful inclination, and because of our sinful
inclination. We are overpowered by the new man in Christ, and the things
of
Christ are all that will ever be comfortable and true to us.
Hebrews 9:27 And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this
the
judgment.
Will Jesus judge us trusting?
This trust is a gift from God as well.
The Scriptures were given to the writer by the Holy Spirit of God. The
understanding of what Scripture says is also given to man, the hearer, by
the Holy Spirit of God. The Word of God never returns void, giving every
man the ability for the first time in his life to understand the spiritual
circumstance and what choices are available.
Isaiah 55:11 ...so shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it
shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I
please,
and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it.
We have all been personally responsible for the costs of the affairs of
our
own lives. We have worked, clothed and fed our children, paid our rent
and
utilities all our lives, in order to have some semblance of comfort and
ease.
Now, for the unimaginable wonders of heaven, we are simply given it as a
gift.
It is assumed by some that heaven is given by the whim of God toward
unsuspecting men. It is also assumed that upon Judgment Day that those
who
achieved a good walk with Jesus will enter in. This is the false gospel
of
ENTITLEMENT.
Be assured, that heaven will not be given to those who have personal
achievements, which is a great impossibility. Heaven will be given to man
by the generosity of God, in spite of who he is, and because of the
achievement of Jesus on his behalf.
It is a gift.
If we are wise, we will take it.
---firefly
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