The Paradox of Merit.. On Trial!
Contents: [Overview:] God Wants Exodus of sons from His Son, replacing sons who choose Divorce] [Divorce Appeal Trial ("DAT") History] [DAT#1, Garden] [DAT#2, Fall–Flood] [DAT#3, Flood–Abram] [DAT#4, Abram–Israel] [DAT#5, Israel–Christ] [DAT#6, Christ–Church] [3 Temptations = Trial Strategy & Tactics] [DAT#7, Church] [Trial Issues] [MISTRIAL] [WASTE] [RAPPORT] [Two 'Relationship' Paradoxes] [God's Four‑Part Trial Answer] [#1, Merit an Effect, never a cause] [#2, God wants RAPPORT, not Merit] [#3, So you get what you want, with God] [#4, Love Subordinates] ['DDNA' of Oneness On the Cross, funds Us] [These Arguments Play on Our 'turf'] [Satan's Tares' Tariff of "good"] [God's Barriers make "good" compete] [Satan uses both Barriers and "good", to HERD] [For Mankind is DEvolving] [Quadrilogy of Church's 'Play', Our Real and Future History] [NT Play #1, Salvation] [NT Play #2, Church Formation] [NT Play #3, Church Impact] [NT Play #4, 2nd Advent] [Appendix Sidebar: The Paradox Parade]
Note to Reader, June, 2007: it's difficult to cover the Trial properly without multiplying webpages, each covering the issues from different angles. This webpage is rather long, but it's much shorter than the Lord vs. Satan. "Our Diplomatic Brief" in DueDisclosure.htm presents the Trial in terms of a Diplomatic and Kingdom Conflict, as does Bible. But in this webpage, we exclusively focus on the root Merit Paradox, which is the "Paradox" Table in Part 5 of the Lord vs Satan. That table is a climactic summation of the Merit Paradox God displays during the future Millennium. The epic-length version of the Divorce Appeal Trial covering all Trial Issues as running threads, is the focus of the mammoth "Thinking" series. How God orchestrates time is also relevant, for the Trial follows His Timing Rules. Those Rules also afford Satan opportunity to end the Trial in his favor. The most succinct presentation of God's Orchestration of Time and Satan's attempts to derail Time, can be found in items #1, #8, #9 of TenWaysThisTimelineDiffers.doc
Overview
There's a Divine Divorce Appeal Trial going on right now between "Satan" (="opposing attourney", Hebrew) and the Lord. God wastes no time alerting us to this Trial: contrary to popular Christianity's claims, Bible's inspired, original language texts from Genesis 1:2 onward show a restoration of Earth due to Satan & Co.'s rebellion (which trashed the planet). Many other Bible verses allusively or directly refer back to Genesis 1:2's "tohu wa bohu" (=trashed up), to reveal essential elements of this our origin; to explain that we are "tohu wa bohu", so the Holy Spirit restores/remakes us to God's level, as a gift to Father and Son. In short, the recounting of the (literal) six-day 'restoration' in Genesis 1 metaphorically depicts His painstaking mothering of regenerate man who elected to Stay Married — in context of the Trial.
[Yes, mothering. The word translated "hover" or "move" in Genesis 1:2 is Hebrew verb rahaph: used of a mother hen incubating (and then rearing) her chicks. Oy zjyamoy boychicks! Greek verb is even more interesting, epiphero: epi has root meaning of "on" or "upon", and phero means "to carry" — like a woman carries her baby: the compound verb means a whole lot more, too. Awesome multiple-entendres, all of them ironic. God makes fun of Himself, right from the start! How does anyone avoid falling in love with Him? New Testament counterparts to Genesis 1: Titus 3:5, Romans 8, 1 Corinthians 6 and 12, all of Ephesians and Hebrews (the latter two also stress purpose of gifting to Father and Son). John and 1 John tie in also, via the "in the beginning" refrain. Re: Genesis 1:2ff being a restoration, not initial creation, there are many verses. Here are some. Initial creation was instantaneous: Genesis 1:1, Psalm 33:6, Psalm 19:1, by the Son (Hebrews 1:3,10, 11:3, 2 Peter 3:5, etc). My pastor taught that the earth had been trashed up by Satan (&Co.), as that was their rebellion headquarters, post Satan's Fall. One of the verses showing recreation not initial creation of Earth in this connection is an aside using asah, Exodus 20:11. God picked Earth to restore so that the Appeal Trial could play on Satan's stomping grounds. There are a surprising number of Old Testament verses on this topic, which use a refrain based on Genesis 1:2's tohu: parallelisms to how Israel defiled the Land, how Satan still trashes up. You need the inspired original language Scripture to see these meanings clearly. What treasure, to do this research. Once you see how your English version translates the original keywords, you can search for more parallels. Here's a starting list: Genesis 1:1-2 compared to Psalm 104:30, Isaiah 45:18, Jeremiah 33:2, 4:23, Isaiah 14:12-17 (especially v.17), Ezekiel 28:11-19. Isaiah 45:7's Hebrew for "evil" raah, should be "evil one", Satan — compares to "darkness" in the previous clause as a parallelism (since God didn't cause darkness (or evil) directly, but did make Haylel-ben-Shachar, aka Satan, the author of it); guess that's why the LXX uses kakos rather than the usual poneros, to tie the type of parallelism (to darkness) in the previous clause. Oh: do a cross-Bible study on poneros! Suggest you get the "1975 Genesis" audiotape series from my pastor (they never ask for money). "Creationism" entry in VERindex.htm repeats some of this paragraph, and adds more information you can use in your own vetting.]
Hence the laconic Genesis 1:1, and John's wry phrasing (in Greek) of WHY the universe was created by and for the Son, in John 1:1ff. GOD WANTS SONS! [Greek wordplay in John is phenomenal. For example, Greek verb lego means to speak or think, and Logos (the cognate noun) in Greek culture had the connotation of Reason, Truth, Ultimateness. Of course, John used it Hebraically, for The Word was long the Hebrew idea of Ultimateness. God is Truth, see. God is ultimate Reality, see. Phenomenal.] For, "Genesis" means the origin of and salvation of MAN, not the origin of the universe. After all, God can bing a whole universe any nanosecond He likes (Genesis 1:1, the preface, elaborated on in John 1:1ff; also Matthew 4:3). But He prefers, to make sons (see Galatians 3, Hebrews 2, etc). Especially, The Son (Jn1:12-14). Heh. (Greek term "genesis", the translated Greek Old Testament's ("LXX", "Septuagint") book title, is only used of MAN: "descent", from which we get the English, genealogy, generation, etc. Greek genesis is pointedly used of Christ, in Matt1:18. Cognate verb is gennao, "become a parent of", "beget". The verb or its noun focuses on birthing, not conception. Trace the usage of both terms. For example, in Prov 8:25, God's 'wisdom' is personified as birthed before Earth existed; that expression stresses how understanding truth matters more than all the world.)
But among the first group of sons (angels) created long before mankind, some of them didn't like the fact that God Alone does their making — instead, they wanted credit for their own 'good', and thus rebelled. In part, this rebellion was triggered by their reaction to The Son eventually planning to add on Humanity, to save mankind. See, they were to rule the mankind, yet under Him, at some point. But HE was also going to be human, Himself? How demeaning. How demeaning to them! Why, that's tantamount to throwing the self, in the trash!
"I will make MYSELF like the Most High", Satan thus argued. And one-third of his fellows, agreed. After all, THEY WERE STARS!
All this, in reaction: for when they rebelled, they learned being stars apart from God wasn't so fun. Too late, though: iconoclastic revenge became the driving force; to overthrow the Son, their prime directive. Their thirst for vengeance against Him, can't be slaked. Cold hatred, finely honed like a razor, phrases their sharp, sarcastic, biting wit, as they prey upon anything God has touched. Ahhh, the pleasure of destroying, torturing whatever/whoever God makes! Screw everybody! Screw us!
So they become 'fathers', too: fathers of destruction, deceit, devastation, desolation, and above all.. derision. Oh, Dios, not God — Derision Imbalance Obfuscation Substitution! Shellgame, He lied to us! He wants grovelling, not true relationship! Let us grovel then, reflect the Most High! Martyrs all, they exult in their sophisticated ennui as victims of their God. Hence their cold contempt, like love, painstakingly crafts each mote of decay in themselves, and in all they touch with thought or body. Until at last, all angels having finally chosen for God or for them, God steps in and rules on the divorce. Trial held, sentence passed: Matthew 25:41. OyOuai! OyOuai! Woe, Woe! What a tragedy! How the mighty are fallen! [There are too many verses requiring too much explanation, to list as support for these four paragraphs. Use 1 John 1:9, ask Father in Son's Name for the Holy Spirit to guide you to the relevant passages. Also, fallen angels think copulation is demeaning, so ridicule God's creation by sponsoring lasciviousness. Study closely all Bible passages referencing fallen angels, preferably in the original languages of Scripture, i.e., using your favorite translation but with lexicons: BibleWorks is a good software program for this purpose. Then, peruse the other 'holy books' for the same keys, note how they ridicule God and man; frequently, by oblique or direct reference to Bible keywords/key concepts. It's a real eye-opener, to do this. The paragraphs above essentially follow what I learned under my pastor (i.e., that the demons knew of man's being created beforehand), but it's pretty easy to prove what he taught, in Bible.]
So other 'sons' (us!) get created, probably to replace the rebelling ones; definitely, to witness to those rebelling, that their rebellion isn't exactly in their own best interest. For what they make, tyrannizes. But what God Makes, Sets Free. Note the Relationship Paradox: Dependence On God Is Freedom. [Nerd note: "son" in Greek also means slave. Paul makes a great pun on that double-meaning in Gal4, partly because a whole play was written tweaking the double meaning: Euripedes' "Ion". Also, the fact that "sons of God" is an Old Testament moniker for angels, yet is also used by the Lord in the Gospels and by Paul to reference believers, indicates an intended replacement; so too, the idea of Satan (&Co.) going to hell, but believers go to heaven; see also the many Bible inheritance/disinheritance analogies, etc. In BibleWorks I found 18 "sons of God" references; hell/heaven and inheritance verses are many more. In short, there is much in Bible on the topic to warrant a conclusion of replacement.]
So, we humans were created for sonship; and, to be witnesses in this Lord vs. Satan Divorce Trial (see Galatians 4~5, John 8:32). All those "witness" verses first refer to Trial Witness, not so much witness to our fellow man. Our witness to our fellow man is brotherly, kinda like a classical Greek Drama "chorus". Not actors, but on the sidelines. For, we being saved, are out of the world, no longer part of it, though physically still in it, living normal lives, etc. (play on Hebrew preposition min, out-from, common Old Testament preposition for birth/separation) — see John 17. So we can advise our fellow men, but our real witness, is to God and the angels (compare all "angels" verses). Because, this is a TRIAL: not a lightshow, not a mystical incantation, not "Left Behind" or anything remotely like the Hollyweird (and relgioweird) paint it. [Man perennially interprets Scripture anthropocentrically. Big mistake.]
Moses wrote Genesis sometime during 1440-1400BC. So the relevant Trial Disclosure was to fallen man, in the wake of the then-famous 1440BC Exodus. Until Moses, everyone knew the basics about God: you can trace this knowledge via the etymological development of God-related words, particularly in ancient Hebrew and Greek. So every child of Moses' day would know God could just think or speak the universe into existence, duhhh: but Why Did He do it, that became the burning question when the Exodus occurred. And, with such an earth-shattering event, the answer needed to be written out; the usual grapevine method would no longer be enough to quench interest. People now wanted First-Hand Testimony, not hearsay!
The Exodus was a famous event in its day. So famous, Thutmosis III scarabs were keepsakes which archeologists have found all over the Middle East. You can also find his story on Cleopatra's Needle, one in New York City (Central Park) and the other, in England. (Egypt gifted them to both countries back in the 19th century, but is now negotiating to get that pair of obelisks back.) Moses was the 'first' Thutmosis III; he was 6 years older than the son by Thutmose II, who later took over as Thutmose III when Moses abdicated. Only the 18th Dynasty used the "mose" moniker; it's not a Hebrew word. So famous was the Exodus, that the Greeks, not the Hebrews, renamed the Sea which Israel crossed dryshod, the "Red" Sea — to commemorate Pharaoh and his army, drowning there. That Pharaoh, was Amenhotep II; his not-first-son would take his place, promised by the Sphinx in a 'dream'. This other son is known to history as Thutmose IV; he probably ruled in his dad's name, at first. Egyptian records oddly reverse the number of years for father and son, yet the father only had nine campaigns, from 1450-1441BC. The son made a diplomatic marriage with the Mitanni. Makes sense, if he had no troops to keep Egypt free. Hatshepsut managed to avoid diplomatic marriage by calling that floating Hebrew boy "Moses" (=gift from Isis); her great-grandson wouldn't have that luxury. So again, the Exodus was famous for destabilizing the most powerful kingdom in the Middle East. Don't expect Egyptian records to admit that.
Exodus was also famous because the 'god' freed an enslaved people: gossip spread fast, as everyone loves to see authority shot down, and everyone loves a good rescue story. So the Real God would have Moses put it all in writing. For what that 'god' did with Israel, shocked everyone. God had just pulled Israel out of a horrendous 400-year slavery in a manner so stupendous, the mere story of their exodus shook up the entire socio-political structure of the Middle East; for at the time, Egypt was the undisputed power center, and as noted above, this exodus was a royal shame to her. The story would thereafter spread around the world, disturbing everybody, cheering some. Moreover, instead of taking a direct route to the Promised Land, God led them in circles in a wasteland for what would become, 40 more years! Why? Who IS this 'desert' God? Why would He DO such a thing, people all over the world would come to ask. And Israel was asking itself, who are we Jews, we who spend our 400 years' wages on making golden calves, that God would go to so much trouble?!! The 'gods' as they knew them, always demanded of man; but this "Jehovah Elohim" wanted no sex, no drugs, no human sacrifice, either! And man sacrificed only what was harmful to him? Enquiring minds, wanted to know more about this God! [Exodus 13:17-18, 32:9ff, Numbers 14:11ff, especially v.33. The 400 years' wages (Exodus 12:40-41) is my pastor's interpretation; I don't remember which verses he uses, but certainly Exodus 12:31-36 would be included. For the terminally anal who think they find contradictions in Bible, Acts 5:36 and 7:6 Genesis 15:13 Galatians 3:17 are all correct: it was 400 years of slavery, and 30 years of non-slavery; so a total of 430 years, 400 of which was slavery. See, precision of meaning in stressing 400, since those were the number of SLAVERY years. Exodate.htm explains how the Exodus date is valid; underlying Exodate is Mirroring.htm's "Joseph" entry, which walks you through the dates. It's heavy, so you won't 'get it' right away. Took me a year to write that page. Everything in it is designed to be tested/audited, and the testing takes you all over the Bible, so takes time.]
Some among mankind craved and were relieved by this message. For, whether past or present, what passes for human wisdom always devolves to some form of ennui. That classic sigh of a French word, tells it all. Whether called fatalism, enjoy-the-moment-because-you-die; whether the Asian asthetic of a falling cherry blossom (fragility of life) or the Roman hard-hat machismo of slitting your veins, man comes to regard sophistication as a combination of cynicism plus romanticism. In a word, martyrdom. All is for nothing, in the end; one is thus a kind of existential messiah, a toy of the gods, giving them pleasure on the way to one's Hades abode.
So after 400 bleeping years of this future salvation story being told everyone by the Hebrews — and the story carried back to lands far and wide, by travellers who went to that Breadbasket of the World for trade or rescue from famine — it was a royal shock to hear the story come true. Israel was actually DELIVERED by her god.. and ON TIME, as promised? No wonder two-thirds of the Exodus population were converts. No wonder the story spread all over the world, with the result that you find it embedded in the language and myths of many ancient polities, even today (especially Greece). After all, you had millions of witnesses to the events.
Ergo the need to write it out. People could compare the written story to what their grandad or great-grandad told them. They could dispute it or not, morph the story or not, but to have a first-hand account of this god by the former Pharaoh of Egypt himself, well.. that would warrant reading; that would provide an unmorphed version of events. Above all, that would provide man with the written Trial Disclosure, since the entire reason there WAS an Israel, was to save all of mankind.. due to the Trial. For, God wants SONS!
So, for this desert God to SAVE a people demonstrably cantankerous; so, for this mothering Yahweh to reveal Himself so tenderly, breeds new hope in breasts long accustomed to sighing, c'est la vie. Potent stuff, Hope. The world was never the same afterwards. Not until the second 'exodus' following the Crucifixion, would the world again know such hope: for, these two coming-outs are the pillars around which all history, is framed. Because, We're In A Trial.
Again, you gauge an event's popularity and origin by tracing the culture, language, myths of the affected peoples. Again, it was the Greeks, not the Hebrews, who renamed the Reed Sea Moses&Co. crossed dryshod, the RED Sea — that's how famous the Exodus was. What became the deus ex machina ending of the classical Greek play, had its roots in the Hebrews. Greeks and Hebrews were closely intertwined early on (i.e., Greek royal intermarriage with Judah and Dan); the Exodus took place when Greece was itself first becoming a maritime power. Lots of reason to believe that what became Sparta and Troy, originated in some way from interaction with the Hebrews, though what you'll find on that topic throughout the internet, varies widely. Then of course, the invasion of the Greek sea peoples from the 1440's onward into Egypt and what became Israel, is a recurring theme of both Bible and history. This too, you can find on the internet, though the dates given are often suspect.
Similarly, in the 1st century AD, Christ was a BIG deal. Disturbed everyone. Pompey, Caligula, Nero all had this 'thing' about the Jewish Temple; of course it was Claudius and every Caesar after him, who persecuted the Jews and Christians. Hence He was controversial, this "Chrestus" and his followers. So everyone and his brother wanted to cash in, write a 'gospel' to compete, get attention, money, approbation. (Same is true today, of course.) So back then, you find what we moderns call the Apochrypha, that slapstick satire collection of alleged-holy 'testimonies', the ancient equivalent of Mad Magazine. For when Someone is Famous, everyone and his brother has something to say. To get money, of course. Gossip flies fast. People must be entertained. And a threatening MESSAGE must be distorted at all costs. Finally, after about two centuries of all this muddling, the original-language texts of Bible were in hiding or kidnapped by the now-century-old, 'mother church', a Revelation 17 copycat straight from John's pen. So then came the Dark Ages, and you had to be a monk or a nun, to get any glimpse of the real Bible at all. So that's what happened, monasteries sprang up all over the place, quietly copying .. and furtively reading, God's Word. For God's Real Word has been and always will be politically-incorrect, in any century. Because.. we're in a TRIAL.
So, then as now, the polities which roiled due to these twin exoduses, were constrained to debunk them, childishly jealous of the exoduses' effect on 'old ways'. Cover up, laugh away, reorder the events, recast their size or significance — in short, bleed them to 'cure' the malady of the subject populi who actually believed in the One Who Did These Things. Herd the masses, in short. It's an old, old, song. The Real God, of course, tells us that man regards Him as foolish (1 Corinthians 2). So, playing the fool, He saves man; even, writes a book about it! See Psalm 11:4, Proverbs 5:21. Also, Jeremiah 5, Psalm 50:21. Because, we're in a Trial.
Much of mankind was threatened by these Two Exodus Messages. For ego needs power, but Weakness of Man is central IN each Message. For, whether past or present, what passes for human power — and hence scholarship — always devolves to some form of political correctness, fitting in. Witness the crazy documentary in the late 1980's or early 1990's, in which scads of professionals combed the Sinai and Negev looking for relic-type 'evidence' of the Exodus, but found none. Millions of dollars were spent on this expedition. Conclusion? WE didn't FIND anything, so the Exodus must not have happened! someone quite smart who saw the documentary, confided to me at lunch. Really? When thousands of years have gone by, they actually expected to find something? I replied. Think: the wilderness is not a hospitable place. You conserve everything. Every precious piece of trash could be burned as fuel or remade into something else. Scavenging in a desert might be the difference between life and death.. for who knows how many other people between (the correctly-dated) Exodus of 1440-1400BC.. and now! Whoever paid the big bucks for that documentary, got scammed.
Man gloms onto just about anything to call himself "good". So if man has some dippy idea about "god", he'll tell himself how "good" he is for believing it. So if the inferiority of his idea is demonstrated by a superior one, then he must debunk. Often, violently. So too, those who have the correct idea of God also arrogate to themselves value, as if their belief were meritorious. So the Real God punishes such people, since after all, HE, not them — is Meritorious. So you see all that, going on in history. Thus the individual has disclosure about THE TRIAL, and lots of competing information to choose from, to make up his own mind.
The individual's life parallels the roiling depicted above. So: do you go through the 'exodus' with God? Those who made "yes" decisions during the original Exodus and the 1st Advent, both needed Written Explanation, and so got them. The polity of Israel developed due to that original Exodus received more Written Explanation, since there was a continuing supply of folks who needed it. Thus we have the Old Testament. When Christ died, though, it was Israel who rejected Him, so a New Testament — he kaine diatheke, explained at length in Book of Hebrews using that Greek term — needed to be written. So, by 96AD, we have the entire Canon in writing. Because, this is a TRIAL, and God thus provides the disclosure we need, via His Book. [The spectacular stuff post-Cross and pre 70AD (tongues, healing, prophesying) was for purposes of Completing Canon (see 1 Corinthians 13); so it largely died with the destruction of the Temple, and finally ended with the completion (and circulation) of Revelation. The biggest Old Testament promise of His Word In Writing, Now Fulfilled, replaces all that. See 1 Corinthians 1:5, 2:16, 11:13 (all verses here are play on the Head as Word covering / protecting / ruling us, how delicious!), 12:21, 31 +1 Corinthians 13's Greek wordplay.]
So our 'journey' is in The Word, not the world; but in order to begin that journey, we must exit our notions about life's meaning down here. First 'exit', to believe in Christ. Afterwards, many exits from notions hampering us, are needed. The exit process requires that we believe what we learn using 1 John 1:9 to stay online with the Spirit, and to study under whomever God has appointed to be our right pastors. A real EXODUS thus ensues, and it is easily as dramatic (though deliberately invisible, these days) as any Cecille B. DeMille epic presentation. Your choice, how you go. God's Power, to take you there!
As a result, the BIBLE and GOD are on Trial. It's not as though God hasn't managed to 'get the Word out' to everyone: in virtually every culture ever on the planet, you have good-and-evil supernatural stories, cast in some version of a Divine Trial. Yet, alone among all the many stories, myths, and holy books in history on this topic, the Bible stresses that man needs a Savior; why the solution is to simply believe in Christ, for there is nothing else man can do to 'get saved'. That fact is a major issue IN the Trial, so it is front-and-center ON Trial, in man's mind. People tend to regard religion as part of culture, so it becomes popular to relegate the Trial to 'my' god or 'your' god who 'fight' each other. That's very Greco-Roman. But the truth now as then, is this: God is not people, religion is Satan's invention, and of course culture, race, politics are each completely irrelevant. But they grab onto "god" to make themselves important. Hence the Trial issue of the Gospel, itself. Hence the Bible is always On Trial, never mind the debunkers who apparently seldom READ it before they debunk it. Of course, the Bible's proponents aren't so good at reading it, either. That leaves the individual free to consult The Bible over which so much controversy, spreads.
One of my big surprises in writing up webpages, was to discover how putrid "Biblical scholarship" has been. Documentaries are particularly bad, passing themselves off as 'scholarly', but really just so much gossip. It's mind-boggling. Do they have the same Bible I do? So too, in internet or print: whether Bible proponent or opponent, you find the most slipshod attention paid to Bible itself, everyone going on what someone else SAYS about the Bible, never researching the Book itself. Worse, books claimed as part of 'Bible' aren't, and stuff allegedly IN the Bible, isn't there! The proof that such claims are false, is almost immediate: takes maybe five minutes' search in Bible, to refute them. Yet these not-Bible items are debated and deprecated decade after decade, resulting in BIBLE being blamed — even though the allegedly bad stuff isn't IN it. That's evil. That's false scholarship. That's putrid. And of course, if there really is a Trial going on between Satan and God, you'd expect pro- or con- 'respected' Bible scholarship to BE putrid, since the world still belongs to Satan.
So don't go by hearsay, including what seems like mine: read the Bible itself, keep asking "God" for insight (use 1 John 1:9 and then ask, if you're already a believer in Christ) — to make up Your Own Mind. For if the Bible is from God, then its Content and Disclosure will prove Divine to the open mind. A mind is 'closed' if the mind is made up either pro- or con- Bible. Try to avoid either 'state', or you'll miss disclosure. Just try to determine WHAT is said, never mind if you like or believe it. If God wanted to force your will, titillate you with emotion or sway you with cultural fit-in norms, there would be no Book to test. Of course, one must be objective, and that's always a problem. One must be careful to check context and attributes of the language and isagogics, of any ancient book. This is not done, with Bible. Frankly, when people think they find mistakes or other problems with Bible, the most frequent cause of the mistake, is the person's own ignorance. All 'my' webpages point out one or another incompetency or mistake people make, so those many instances won't be repeated here. What's relevant here, is that a reader has a Book to compare. An admittedly controversial Book, in any generation. A mistranslated Book, a book people love and hate, a book which above all, begs many questions. Why would this Book be written the way it is? Because, we're in a TRIAL. So this Book, is about Something Legal. Like, your relationship with God, both now and forever. Whether you believe IN the Book, is quite beside the point. You don't know what to believe, until you know what it actually SAYS. Frankly, that's why I write webpages, to test myself and the Bible itself. How do I know I understand what it says, if I can't repeat what it says? Then, I test what I write. Constantly.
For to know what BIBLE says, you gotta think like a ruler or lawyer, which means constant testing and questionning. Even a five-year old can do this: "What makes sense?" "What is right?" "Do I have enough facts?" Moreover, precise communication is required, lest you misread. Surely a Real God would want to be precise. So, for example, Bible quotations in the Bible are often NOT word-for-word alike their source (viz., Matthew 4:10 quoting Deuteronomy 6:13). The quotation is often changed in some obvious way To Show Interpretation of the verse(s) quoted. Or, a later Bible passage will concatenate (patch together) a bunch of other verses. Both the interpretative quote and the concatenated quote create precise Legal Communication. Hence the quotation's context can be searched and thus will amply interpret meaning intended in the quotation itself. This is an ancient legal practice, and is common in law today: it's called "incorporation by reference", "citation", and many other legal names. Thus one can properly read a legal document, testamentary will, trust agreement, deposition, interpret law, etc.
Legal writing is hallmarked by such precision. Right down to keywords. That requires you have some long-term interest in doing so. A disbelief or a low-level of belief will soon extinguish interest. At which point, the reader quits, and can console himself that the Bible is wrong or something only an 'expert' can know. If your interest is high enough, however, then as you read even a translation, watch carefully and research any repeated words. If using the original-language texts (far preferable), watch every nuance of syntax, grammar, etymology, etc. Be patient: it takes some years of study, because a database of rhetorical style and information is being built in you. God takes the empirical approach, too: Bible itself is your archeological site par excellence. Not one moment of all that patient waiting, will receive less than a bizillion percent interest. [As you learn Scripture, the way to analyze it is also built in you. For example, you'll look at a verse and suddenly, click! you see a meaning, or a connection to another verse you already learned. That process takes a nanosecond, so although it's very fast, you gotta keep studying for all those clicks! to accumulate. Their accumulation forms what my pastor likes to call a "frame of reference" — which, in computer terms, is a relational database, replete with the relationship formulas, built-in. For, if you're gonna relate to God, you gotta have the same 'hookups' (Truth relationships) in your own soul. So it's worth it to keep plugging. You need to keep breathing 1 John 1:9 as you read, or you'll just go in circles. Need God's Brains to read God's Word. That's why Bible scholarship is putrid, the verse goes unused even by believers. The most an unbeliever can learn from Bible, is Gospel and that God really wrote it: that's how we all become Bible believers, in the first place. God makes it clear HE wrote the Book. So you READ the Book, to test that claim. No hearsay. Any outside-Bible 'witness' you get, i.e., from this webpage — is but adjunctive, merely designed to alert you to what might actually BE in the Bible from God. But you ASK, Him.]
Above all, the Bible is a set of legal documents of every kind ever known to man, and precision matters. Rounding of numbers, for example, precisely tells you that the idea, not the exact number, is being stressed. See, from the first verse in Genesis to the last verse in Revelation, the original languages of Scripture constantly express Trial Issues In Trial Language, so you analyze Scripture legally. Literary analysis rules you may have learned in your native-language classes are extremely helpful, too. Every verse is chock-full of humor; translations largely strip the (especially sexual) humor out, as if God had to be boring, to be majestic; so to say you study Scripture legally, doesn't mean it's boring. Quite the opposite: man's legal documents are very boring. But God's legal documents (Bible) are so exciting and provable, would that I never needed to eat or sleep! Usually, the picking-apart of a document or literary work wrecks the enjoyment of the 'read', which is why we all snooze in literature classes or live on Cliff Notes. But not here! Don't deprive yourself of the happiest hours you will ever know, by glossing over Scripture.
Thus, Genesis is about the legal raison d'etre of man. And Revelation, shows how man ends up, en masse. Genesis, the origin of The Monadic Man, the Christ; Revelation, His Completion of Time. Because, This Is A Trial, in which He is the Chief Witness ("First and Last", "Alpha and Omega", and "Faithful and True Witness" Bible titles). So, a full accounting must be done; so, a full disclosure to man must be given. Because, we are witnesses in the docket, too. The Jobs and Abrams and Pauls of history are star witnesses, but every human is a witness, and any human can become a star witness, because only the Holy Spirit makes man, spiritually. [The Pharisees, for example, were witnesses ("sons", John 8:44) of Satan. Look up all verses with "witness" and "son" in them. A child is by nature a witness of who 'makes' him, get it?]
Which Bible and God, we the human race are free to reject or accept at any time. This is our Trial Witness Question: WHO do we choose to do our making — God, or ourselves? If God, then you Learn His Word via the Holy Spirit, Who Makes You Able To Become Like His Son. Truth is, we can't make anything ourselves. So only God, or Satan (&Co.), 'make' us. So our 'witness' is not so much to our fellow man; the larger witness is before God and in the Trial. So we humans are witnesses, making up our minds about whether this Bible is from God. If we believe in Christ, we say the Bible is from God. But that doesn't mean we are good witnesses. Most of us are not. Because, until the believer understands this TRIAL, he will forever mistake what he does, as counting before God. In which case, he testifies on behalf of Satan.
Only GOD is Righteous, has Merit.
So only if God makes you from Himself, do you acquire Merit.
Satan contends that creature merit should count before God.
Hence no one should go to Hell.
Good-and-evil, not sin, is also on Trial here. Good IS evil, anti-God, for it claims to COUNT before God. Sin was nailed to the Cross. So that leaves what man considers "good", which came from the Tree of the Knowledge of good-and-evil — literal Hebrew signifies one thing, not two — which Satan invented. That's Satan's plan for the human race, and Adam 'ate' it. Then, Adam and the woman changed their minds, opting instead for God's Plan ("and I ate" clauses in Genesis 3). That's why we are here: looked like Satan won the Trial, but the witnesses Changed their Votes. So mankind now exists. So the Gospel and Bible are On Trial for being from God; good-and-evil are On Trial, for being from Satan. Any human can Vote Which Plan he wants. With eternal consequences.
We are currently in Divorce Appeal Trial ("DAT") Round #7, aka "Church". Bible calls this the "Age over the Ages", a Greek lexeme (Ephesians 3:21) for the highest-value and culminating-value epoch. Book of Hebrews shows this "Church" "Age" is the Final Phase in the Trial, Hebrews 11:40. Tribulation and Millennium are literal periods after the Completion of "Church", and function like postscripts. Those two later periods constitute Satan's reply and God's Epilogue, respectively. As all the New Testament writers stress in their variant ways, when Church's "Body" completes (Greek: teleiow and plerow, usually mistranslated), so does God's Trial Rebuttal to Satan.
"Rapture" signifies Church Completion, end of Round #7. "Rapture" has a rape connotation, not a goody-goody feeling. Term derives from the Vulgate in 1Thess4:17, Latin "rapto" (snatchup, idea of invading army carrying off the women, translating the same meaning from Greek verb harpazw). It's not a 19th century invention. Part IV of the Thinking series explains why the Rapture is valid and precedes the Tribulation. The shortest math proof of this fact is on Ten Ways this Timeline differs: it helps a reader orient to the longer GeneYrs.xls and Mirroring.htm, both of which demonstrate from Bible, the larger topic of God's Blessing Orchestration of Time. The Rapture happens because Israel's time had run out. Hence to bridge back to the Promised Time of Israel, Church was inserted. Church Time is not set, but rather its Body Count is set, and Satan's contending that's grounds for Mistrial. When that Body is Built, Church's Rapture removal thus also completes that 'time bridge' back to Israel's reserved time (Trib and Mill). The Bible math is conclusive, even if you didn't have hundreds of Rapture verses: Israel had a set time limit, known since David died. That time ended 30AD, owing to Israel's rejection 7 years short of the allowed deadline of 37AD. As a result, the shorted seven years played against Israel in 64-70AD, with the Tribulational "seven" still in reserve. The rest of Time was Conditioned on Messiah completing. That would justify the Millennium: He succeeded in 'buying' that time, which is really 1050 years, a basic Time unit God uses since Adam. Time was supposed to end, after the Millennium ended, and in our dating scheme that worked out to 1144AD.
Um, we're way past that deadline. Here's why. When Messiah was rejected near Passover 29AD (going by Matt16:18's parallel in John 6:4-66ff), Church was prospectively invented via a new Testamentary Contract between Father and Son, to continue the Trial beyond Round #6. Um, you can see why Satan might object to that. It's kinda like the movie "Harvey", starring James Stewart. Hi, We see this Entity no one else can see, we made a contract about it DURING the Trial, and now we bring it in as Evidence for the Trial to continue, instead of end due to Israel's Time Running Out. Yeah, you just try to make a motion like that, in a US court of law!
Hence Satan's contending it's a Mistrial to insert Church, since Israel FAILED; well, ulp — he first agreed to it before the Cross, because that would up the Cost Of Suffering for Christ to an unbelievable level, see the terms in John 17:20-21. Didn't seem possible Christ would live under that much pressure. But of course after He succeeded, the Motion for Mistrial is all Satan has left. Seems like The Most High is gerrymandering the Trial Outcome, to INVENT an entity which didn't exist anytime prior, and then INVOKE it, at the very time I won Israel's Rejection! In modern jurisprudence, this is tantamount to the Prosecution claiming Non-Existent New Evidence at the last minute which the Defense doesn't get a chance to Examine and Refute. Hence, grounds for a Mistrial Verdict. So Church has no set time promised to her, anywhere in Bible — because, she wasn't supposed to EXIST. That's why Church is grounds for a Mistrial. More on Mistrial follows in "Trial Issues" later on in this page; it's also covered in the foregoing other pages (i.e., TenWays).
Everything about Church is new, yet precedented on a separate, eternity-past KINGSHIP Contract between Father and Son recorded in Psalm 110, Isaiah 53:12, 1 Timothy 2:5; which Book of Hebrews, painstakingly explains. It's the Precedence of that Kingship Contract, which makes "Church", inventable. Bible term "Church" references our Royal Priesthood status (i.e., 1 Peter 2:5, 9, Revelation 1:6, 5:10, all of Hebrews 5~10). It has a counterpart aggregate term, "Body of Christ" (often just called "Body", in New Testament), referencing our Royal Bridal Relationship role throughout eternity; hence the Bride is now Betrothed, and is 'preparing', so to speak. In fact, it's that Role which was the purpose of history As A Gift To Son (Eph1); hence this Final Round in the Trial is part of "the last days" (eschatos), wrapping up history. The "Body" references the Body Count criterion, so that's why there's no Time Set. Since Time is conditioned upon believers being sufficiently spiritually developed to be awarded time (main focus of Mirroring.htm), and since those bodies are yet-future (relative to Matt16:18), there's a very real chance Satan can win. For Time Must Stop If It Cannot Be Awarded. Cell A2 in GeneYrs.xls will succinctly present that criterion, true since Adam. It's a shocker, and you can verify it via the Bible's many date-verses.
After Church, the Trial is effectively over, but Satan must have his final rebuttal (which is the Tribulation, a return to finish the last 7 years allotted to Israel, so Church is not Israel, so not on earth, Revelation 4:1). After his rebuttal ends and he loses, the long-promised Millennial Reign of the Messiah occurs. During that "time" (Bible keyword, usually aiwnos), certain members of the Body of Christ are to visibly rule Gentile nations (part of the implementation of the Old Testament "peace" promise to Israel). The Millennial Trial post-script accomplishes the one Trial goal Satan could never complete, on his own — and then, answers it: Perfect environment? No, it does not make man happy.
So that's our Overview. It's all about Exodus. Leaving behind a world hostile to God, to enter the Kingdom of God, even while still on earth. Voting. It's only and always about Voting, never sin or works or merit, but rather, Relationship: do you want God, or not? Do you want God to make you in His Son's Image, or not? So next, let's do what the Book of Hebrews does in Chapter 11 and review Trial History, thus far. [Book of Hebrews is vilely mistranslated in key spots so you don't see the Trial focus. No translator intended that. Hebrews 11:1 is a succinct presentation of the Trial issue being Word Believed as the believer's Unseen Trial Witness. Heb111.htm has a corrected translation. After you see it, you'll better understand why the writer then launches into a roster of Trial witnesses since Abel. Notice that none of them are listed as doing good deeds, but rather their BELIEF got tested in the Trial Docket.]
Trial History
Back to our Legal Origin, pre-mankind: some among the original 'sons' — aka fallen angels or demons — rebelled in favor of what THEY could do, and against what God could do for them. They rebel against needing God, and prefer to think that God needs them. Hence, their rebellion is based a claim of superior merit. Or, put more negatively.. that God is bad. The first Trial was held sometime before man's creation; and sentence was rendered (Matthew 25:41), but not carried out. So, the case must be on Appeal. [My pastor figures Satan appealed with a claim like, how can a loving God cast His Creatures into the Lake of Fire. That supposition makes sense, when you read passages like the Third Temptation in Matthew 4; or hear, on any day, a God-is-Unfair claim spoken by human mouth.]
For, as we see from Genesis 1:2 onward, man is created to give them an opportunity to prove their case; man, because more angels don't prove anything further; man, because the rebellers need a lower creature over whom to have sufficient influence, so they can make their case. If THEY can make man meritorious, then a claim of merit before God has weight. So, for example at the beginning of Job 1 and 2, the Trial convocation shows Satan accusing God of bribing Job's love. Defense mechanism of projection, that. Satan is self-righteous, and would very much like to herd man into a nice tyrannical state such that man doesn't sin against man. To do this, paradoxically, he has to sponsor sin. Satan sponsors sin in order to separate man from God. Thereafter, he condemns sin himself, and offers his idea of a way to pay for that sin — in lieu of the Cross (same gambit as in Matthew 4). Religion is his anti-cross proposal (viz, Tree in Garden, Ziggurat of Babel, Genesis 6, Revelation 17, etc. — more on these follow, below). So, the more humans buy his anti-cross, the more he thinks he wins in the Trial. And here you thought the devil had red horns and a tail.
So, Divorce Appeal Trial Round #1, the Garden, pre-Adam's Fall: date indeterminable. Until the Fall, God doesn't number Adam's days, so you cannot tell how long this First Round lasted. You can't tell how old the earth was, either. All you have as 'civilization' (other than the angels), is two humans. The Voting Issue is stark. Two very real trees in the Garden: one of Lives (Heb: chayim, plural, representing God's Thinking), and one of Good-and-Evil (Satan's thinking). There is no magical property in either tree. They are real trees, real fruit, depicting something else by physical analogy. If the fruit is eaten, the something else got voted for, so the something else, actually happens. These "tree" and "fruit" analogies are thus repeated throughout the Bible, and never represent any magical properties. So leave mysticism and tabooism back in the sandbox.
In Genesis 3, you thus see the latter tree's promise sold to the woman by Satan (nicely speaking through an animal, so as not to overawe her with his beauty), in Genesis 3. Fearful Elohim (epithet! god-is-just-a-collection-of-goodies) withhold Knowing good-and-evil from you, Isha. If you eat, you will be as good as Elohim (epithet! god-is-just-a-collection-of-goodies). She eats, of course. Adam, too. But, Genesis 3 goes on to show how they both afterward agreed that God was right; hence the perpetuation of the human race, for continuing witnesses need to exist. That's why men have been variantly eating from both trees, ever since.
Fruit-bearing trees don't make themselves, so they aren't the cause of any fruit-bearing — it happens TO the tree, get it? Surely any five-year-old can see this. But oh! We Christians point the finger at self and others about OUR 'fruit-bearing'? See whose fruit we're eating? Satan's. See the decline of reason since Adam? The "Fall.. Religious Fantasy" link in Part II of the Thinking series, covers this Phase of the Trial in detail. There, you'll notice how Adam lost his reason altogether when he sinned. So our current insane ideas that we make ourselves anything, have an origin in that forbidden fruit.. Satan's plan to make us 'evolve' into righteousness, bear fruit of ourselves.
Main theme of this Trial Phase was Relationship with God.. or Satan. Genesis 3 has been the theme of human history, ever since. All Trial Arguments on both sides reflect it. Adam had to choose between God or people, then represented by the woman. Adam had to choose between relationship with God, or what he could make of himself. The woman of course had to choose between what God gave her, or what she could make of herself. The entire human race has been choosing like this, ever since. When people are as important or more important than God to you, you're voting on Satan's side in the Trial. Religion always puts doing for people on par with God. Big lie. Biggest evil on the planet, totally immoral.. in the name of morality and God, of course!
After the Fall, Trial enters its Second Phase, ending with the Flood, 4106-2450BC. Man works his buns off, generally prefering Satan's fig leaves plan, getting precious little benefit. Periodically, he gets tired of all that huffing, so switches his huffing into phallicism. Religiously, of course. Since God wants to make sons, that's a type of begetting, so Satan &Co. have great fun deriding man by combining sex and religion — most comprehensively in Genesis 6, where the Trial phase ("riv", Hebrew) ends up with all but eight witnesses on the devil's side; only Noah and his family remained in God's docket. Satan (&Co.) had two goals during this Phase: 1) get mankind on their side, so 2) infect the gene pool, for in copulating with angels, you are rejecting a future PURE HUMAN Savior. The angels involved in that caper are in Tartarus now (under the Euphrates River, according to Peter). They will be released during the Tribulation. Jude draws analogy to those of his day who infect the soul with demon doctrines, to those back in Genesis 6, who tried to prevent pure Humanity from existing. It's not an allegory. Many myths of the past record this time in history, most notably the Greek myths about 'gods' copulating with humans. It was a very violent time.
Main theme of this Trial Phase was Power versus Grace, with Satan trying to wow humans with fantastic demon abilities. It nearly worked. Satan's results, however, weren't so great: those who bought into the demon displays themselves became violent, self-serving, corrupt, exulting in bloodshed and rapine. Better to not have been born during this time. Of course, the goal was to destroy the human race early on, so that a Savior couldn't be born; no sense in trying to make man good, when you can faster kill him off. You can tell the prevailing Trial issues by the names given; trouble is, finding the real meaning of these names is a pistol. Parse out the Hebrew. These are real people and the names are real, but they christened their kids based on the Trial and the 'character' of both the times, and the child's life. So the naming is at once epic-historical and prophetic. GeneYrs.xls seeks to 'translate' these names, based on Hebrew lexicons in BibleWorks 5.
However, there were several Star Witnesses: Adam became one, followed by Seth then Jared, Enoch, and probably Methusaleh. The full roster is in Genesis 5. The father of Noah, Lamech, appears to be one of them. Of these witnesses, at least three were given grants of actual historical Time so that the world could go on living: Adam, Jared, Enoch. Thus the first 1050 year unit of history, could complete. Details are in Mirroring.htm and GeneYrs.xls. In the latter, cell A2 has a helpful note which pops up if your mouse passes over it.
During that second 1050-year period (granted due to the heroes above), Noah=REST received Time Grants and a covenant which secured the continuance of the human race despite the Flood which basically 'cleaned house'. Principle: freedom must be allowed, yet evil must be cleaned up once it impinges on freedom. Notice: the idea of a Savior is but a promise, no set timeline given. Each generation which believes in Him carries that promise of future Son, but when is either not said, or not disclosed in writing. Notice further that NO GOOD DEEDS are recorded of any of these people. Even Noah himself, only built a boat — to save his family. Can't call it a good deed, something you do to benefit yourself.
So the gross display and wowing of power versus the quiet grace of believing, ended with a Flood. Not majority rules, but results, controlled. And when you vote for Satan's plan, the end is violence, not morality. This theme continues throughout history, an upgrade on Genesis 3.
From Noah's Rescue came the Third Trial Round, and Operation Ziggurat Babel, yet another religious ploy, resulted in nations: 2450BC-2060BC. Satan's goal then was to have man vote on his side, again — by uniting them all under one government-by-religion. Made easier, by the fact (duh) that all Noah's kids, had a language in common. So to vote for that one-world-ism was again a vote against a Savior. This too was against Trial rules, because it forced a tyrannical state. Hence the language was confused, and man got breathing space by being divided up. From there, a lone guy named Abram, who was originally from a tribe of pagan priests — believed in God and then stayed in God's docket. Just when Noah's 490-year Time Grant was to expire — which would have ended history — Abraham also received Time Grants and a covenant, to secure both the people and the land for them, that God promised. Principle: God keeps His Promises, but you only get the promises if you want them (theme of Romans 4, 9). Freedom, again: one is free to reject what God promises.
Main theme of this Trial Phase was Institutional Tyranny versus Freedom. It's somewhat of a reversal from the prior Phase, in that Satan resorts to one-world-ism, versus the 'power' and hence 'competition' among peoples, prior. That in part was necessary since everyone was related to each other, post-Flood, and the population was small. So bang the drum on relatedness, oneness, and mock God's Oneness Plan that way.. religiously. When man perceives himself as part of a larger group and is urged to be loyal to it, that substitutes for God. So man comes to want a writ-large version of himself, instead of God. That produces tyranny. God quickly dispels it simply by confusing language, so man's allegiance is proven to be but word-deep. Yeah, and if you took in the Real Word during this time — which was communicated directly, what with demons being knowingly present on earth — if you took in the Real Word instead, you were truly free. Genesis 11 lists the hero roster of those who did the latter.
So the gross display and wowing of misplaced loyalty versus the quiet freedom of believing God, ended with nations. When you vote for Satan's plan, the end is tyranny, which is immorality in the name of morality. Absolutely nothing is so immoral, as religion. Obviously this trend continues throughout history, another upgrade on Genesis 3. [Note to self: see if there is evidence of homogeneity of myth and language during this period. Doesn't mean only one language was on earth, but rather that people had at least one language in common. It's a fairly recent period, must be about 2200BC or so for the Ziggurat. "The whole world" wouldn't be that many people, they all would have at least one language in common since they are all descendants of Noah's KIDS. You can't tell population size by the relics, because those are just buildings and other leftovers from the Flood. But there should be something etymological and something in the stories, to show an erstwhile unity.]
From Abraham, the Trial really cranks up in Round #4, resulting in the Jewish race: 2060-1440BC. Here the Trial makes a striking departure, as God finally narrows the Promise to but ONE man, Abram. So now Satan can more keenly target his efforts on this one man. So here, the Trial stops being so much an argument about his vaunted efforts to better mankind, and becomes instead, an all-out persecution. God helps Satan, as always, by making his promise TO Abram as upsetting as possible: 1) all Abram wants, is a son — but God delays it; 2) God promises that the promised sons will first go through 400 years of SLAVERY, before 1) has even proven true; 3) when the promised son finally arrives, about 20 years later God asks Abram to SACRIFICE that son. This, even though God is against human sacrifice? Heck, Satan has almost no work to do, God's already driving Abraham crazier than Satan would!
The Jews are but one segment of Abraham's progeny: Abram had many sons via Ishmael; and many more, when Sarah (nee: Sarai) later died and Abraham married Keturah ("incense"). All those non-Isaac progeny, are Arabs. By contrast, the Jews are a race solely born of faith, not genes (Genesis 12, Genesis 15:6, Romans 4, Romans 9:1-23). Sarah was the mother of Isaac (her renaming from b*tch to Princess is a phenomenal statement of her transforming faith).
The Jews alone are to be the physical progenitor of Messiah=the Savior, Who would bear all mankind's sins. This new-in-history bloodline was perpetuated due to four successful witnesses — Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph — staying in God's docket, and they each went through hell. Each of them received a perpetuation of the Abrahamic covenant, severally. Abraham believed God would give him a son, then believed God would restore his son if God allowed Isaac to die when sacrificed. But before Abraham had any sons, he was given a Promise of SLAVERY for 400 years as the precondition for becoming a promised people (Genesis 15:13). So when Jacob entered Egypt in 1870BC, he knew what he was getting into. So did Joseph (read the Genesis Chapters on these guys, see Joseph's instructions about his sarcophagus before he dies). Pretty big faith, huh. So Satan's goal during this phase was to persecute Abraham — who was rich and famous in the ancient world, hob-nobbing with kings — and then also persecute all his progeny. Kinda easy to do, if that family is famous. Joseph was given a 490-year time grant dated from when he was enslaved (at age 17).
Main theme of this Trial Phase was the Supremacy and Independence of Faith in God versus all God's (or Satan's) institutions. Satan always keys his arguments to God's grants, taking the grant itself and turning it on its head. Back in the First Phase, God's grant was knowledge, learning and seeing God directly. So Satan targeted knowledge and seeing. In the Second Phase, it was about God's Grace, which required man eschew his own power in favor of God's, so Power was targeted. Third Phase, God's stress on faith being the reason for the rescue, naturally was reversed as a tyrannical religion whose 'faith' you had to be loyal to, or you were bad, not fitting in. So here in the Fourth Phase, you see Satan play on faith in NATIONS, loyalty to them, being supreme. So each nation had its own gods. God's Reply: faith in GOD is the Superior Loyalty, superceding all others. And Abram was the poster boy for that, himself a priest of a nation, with most of his family joining him in an exodus. (That land was shortly overrun, afterwards.) God, of course, has him leave. So the superior loyalty to God, irrespective of family or nation, is demonstrated. And Abram demonstrated it the more, because he didn't have any kids. Promise of kids, and a promise that those kids will go into slavery. Not exactly the kind of promise that sounds fair. But is exactly the kind of promise which shows the supremacy of faith in God over all else in your life. As a result, a people is 'fathered' from Abraham alone, and every culture on the planet has a morphed version of this story in its myths (i.e., Ion, by Euripedes).
Of course, here we have the gross display of racism as a substitute 'savior', versus the Faith-Origin of Abraham's progeny resulting in Real Messiah. It ends with the Exodus. This upgrade on Genesis 3 is quite obvious. Even Jews misuse the story, despite Moses' many warnings in Deuteronomy. Not to mention, everyone and his brother ever since trying to claim they are the true Jews, so that the definition of "Jew" itself has become fuzzy. (Even modern Israel has problem with this, deeming you not a Jew no matter your genes, if you ever believed in Christ. The true definition is bifurcated, and YES your genes matter for earthly protection portions, see Genesis 12, 15, 17, Romans 4 and 9. In other words, to be saved you must do what Abram did, BELIEVE, Genesis 15:6. Doesn't matter what your genes are. But even if you didn't do that yet, if you're of Jewish race, anyone cursing you is cursed, anyone blessing you is blessed.)
So, Round #5: the Nation Israel begins, 1440BC-70AD. Yet it too, only has one Witness (Moses) during the first 40 years, so God preserves it. Moses is given Time Grants in the very year Joseph's 490-year Time Grant runs out. During that time, two other Witnesses go in the docket, Caleb and Joshua — the other adults end up rebelling, so their corpses get strewn throughout the wilderness, i.e., per Numbers 14. Thereafter, Israel is sustained by a succession of witnesses such as David, the prophets, etc. 'All waiting for the Promised One, the Messiah, which in Greek is translated, "the Christ". "Emmanuel", God-with-us, God-and-man in One Person, forever. For, God had "sevened" Him as the REST for mankind. Like Moses, David turns out to be the Star Witness of the period. For God uniquely gave David at least six personal and two Temple time grants — with the expiry of these, the Trial and the world was supposed to end, with Messiah's Coming. Then Messiah would rescue Israel and the world. Why? David VOTED for God's House, which represented Messiah-to-Come. [Hebrew word for promise/swear/oath is often a verb "to seven", taken from the Seventh Day on which God 'rested'. Book of Hebrews uses plays on words with "to seven", throughout: note especially Hebrews 4 and 6. Idea that "7" (the Fulfillment of the Promise) is completed via Church (e.g., in Heb11:39-40). Since the letter's audience were believing Hebrews, and the destruction of Jerusalem was known to be imminent, a big task of the epistle is to show What Changed Due To Christ's Session. Cross-reference the book's keyword synonyms and synonymal concepts, see for yourself.]
- Garden: Relationship with God or Satan, choosing God as #1 versus people or self.
- Fall-Flood: Power versus Grace, believing in what God can do versus what you can do.
- Flood-Abram: Institutional Tyranny versus Freedom, keeping lesser loyalties in their proper place, so to be Independent and Free to believe in God.
- Abram-Israel: Supremacy of Faith in God versus all else, the idea that if one must choose, God First and Only, eschewing all other loyalties.
- Israel-Christ: God's Word above all else, even if a privileged nation under God, since Even God Subjugates Himself to His Word.
Main theme of this Trial Phase is that Rule-of-Law supercedes all else, and that the Real God Himself Subjugates Himself to Law: so much, He will take on Humanity and Save His People forever (Heb7:28). This was unheard-of, in history. Look how clever Satan was: with nations, he played the Babel trick, making each nation have its own gods. So to be loyal to the nation, you had to be loyal to its gods. That's tyranny, using God's own 'nation' as the 'hook'! On top of that, each nation's king was the head priest; on top of that, the king ruled by whim, and himself was above the law, for the king WAS 'the law'. So it was a kind of mafiosi world, until Israel came along. In the Mosaic Law, GOD COMMITS HIMSELF in a contract with the people. All is measured by that contract. Didn't matter if you were Jewish or not, you were part of the contract if you became a citizen of Israel. You didn't have to be a believer; even the Levitical priests didn't have to be believers, to serve. (They only had to be free of certain physical defects, and of the right bloodlines.) So here, Satan's ploy of mixing his goals in the previous four phases, is flatly proven inferior. So people voted with their feet, and many were saved. Well, if Israel's 'god' commits himself to the people, but 'my' god doesn't, I Prefer to Vote for Israel's God... Byeeeee.
God began this phase with a bang, the Exodus. Egypt was the satanic representation of a "good" nation, par excellence. Everyone aped her. Yeah, and when Israel was delivered out from her, that changed many a polity from then onward. For the Law was unique, spoofing everything Satan had invented until that time. Then God brought them to the most strategic piece of real estate on earth: it BRIDGED three continents, so Israel would thereafter make money on the people who TRAVELLED through it. So what her Law said, would be necessary to know; would be spread by haters and lovers alike. People love to talk about controversial subjects, and they love stories which prove kings get defeated, and people get rescued.
Because creature merit never counts toward God (i.e., Romans 4:2), and because creature relationship to creature is separate from creature relationship to God, God Himself has always prescribed a separation between secular and spiritual — i.e., separation of church and state. So, the spiritual has always been an independent option. Satan always unites church and state in every gambit. So, with the advent of Israel, God codified the principles of separation (i.e., three divisions in the Law, entole, dikaiomata, krimata), and then presided over the nation to show the separation was God-Authored. That's in part why the Exodus was in terms of Appeal to Pharaoh, rather than removing the people without his permission. God thus vindicates the separation of church and state, because a) He Himself deferred to Pharaoh in making the request, and b) Pharaoh's refusals demonstrated the evil of uniting the two. For Egypt was a union of religion and secular, as was typical of that era; so Pharaoh as the head of Egypt's religion and state, was rejecting God's Rights over it, and God demonstrates His Rights are Independent and Superior, so no union of the two is valid. Now you get a better appreciation for why the Exodus created such a worldwide 'stir': Egypt, such a great power which deified the King, was defeated by this God of the Hebrews who separated the polity from His Own Kingship, made Even Himself, Subject To Law! That's a killer, rule-of-law being supreme even over the leader. That had never been done in history, prior. [Side note: the three divisions' LXX names are regular; the Hebrew words which are their counterparts, vary widely, i.e., sometimes entole is used for mitzvot, but not always. Hence the Hebrew names are not listed. Worse, the English translations of the same three words are not uniform, so it's very hard to separate out which laws belong to which divisions, from a translation. By the way, this separation of church and state remains. Even in the Millennium, the priesthood of Church, doesn't function over nations on earth. The Kingship role then is separate (two crowns, one priestly and one secular, with the former not operating in the same sphere). It seems as though the two are united in eternity, but I've not yet studied the question enough to be sure.]
Consequently, Israel's dikaiomata provisions (spirituality, usually translated "ordinances" or "statutes"), were entirely voluntary. Just as you may have a secular job, but also maybe a 'church' job (definitely true, for any believer, even if he never steps foot IN a church); so also, the Levitical priests had secular hats they wore. Moses, for example, was the Mediator between God and Israel (see Gal3), but had his own secular hat as leader, too (and as a result was not a priest). So, although every law had both spiritual and secular aspects to it, many were wholly separated (i.e., everyone, believer or no, had to observe the Sabbath on pain of death, but no unbeliever was required to bring Levitical sacrifices).
Only Messiah could unite the two offices, since only Messiah would be the sacrifice for sins. Even so, Messiah was to be the King-Priest Toward Father: so, the potential promise to the nation was that they would eventually become a Nation Of Priests, on behalf of the Gentiles (lit., nations, meaning all other nations). Notice again, the Two Kingships, separated. In His Own Person, Christ is King-Priest TO Father, but Israel was potentially a priest nation to Christ.
So all the Levitical sacrifices were reminders of how Messiah would pay for all mankind's sins, and thus a reminder of the promise of their own future, as well. Hence, eating part of the sacrifice, was typical; it was like our Eucharist, even during the non-Passover days. The unbeliever could view the procedure and metaphorically derive the Gospel from it, but those who participated in the sacrifices, were all believers. So it was a reminder of the Promise of Messiah, not at all a system of salvation — but an Assurance of Messiah-to-Come (Jewish term). Most of the Old Tesament prophets spent much time bucking up Israel to warn of apostacy, to warn of not waiting, of not accepting Messiah when He would come. It was a warning somewhat akin to our Rapture — Date Not Known, pre-David. Because, it would depend on voting THEN. Hence the frequent sacrifices and warnings were to assure and remind. They were already saved (else this whole setup is superfluous, capisce).
Satan's outfoxed; thereafter, his goal then focuses exclusively on destroying Israel, because since God subjugates Himself to Word-above-Name (Psalm 138:2b), then Satan can't use any of his previous ploys effectively. Satan's success hinged on ruler whim being law, so to keep the idea of "god", capricious. So now he's after Israel: must get her to repudiate this "god" which flies in the face of all the other versions he's painstakingly crafted. So first he gets her to repudiate God as King. So, in comes Saul. God 'replies' by setting up David, and then housing the Promises IN David, 2 Samuel 7. David gets Time grants which alone caused history to continue from his lifetime, onward. The Temple gets its own 490-year Time Grant, due to and boundaried by, David's Time Grants. Same is true for Messiah. Every Temple-significant date or deadline is literally 'housed' by a matching Davidic deadline. Same is true for Messiah's birth, life length, and death. There would be no mistaking God is the God of the Jews, from this date-syncing, alone. Dates were easy to calculate, in the ancient world. You measured "years from" Adam, then whatever king or national birthdate applied. Yeah, and that's what God does with David, all the way through Messiah (i.e., Daniel 9 is parsed and valued, based on the Davidic deadlines).
Thus the promises of God are no longer solely dependent on Israel, but on David; however, for Israel to share in that promise, she would have to obey the Law, build and keep the Temple. This she eventually repudiated, too. Satan won that in 586BC, and the Temple was razed. At that point, the Contract with Israel was in full breach, 1 Kings 6 and 9.
However, Daniel admitted the breach and Voted For the Temple to be Rebuilt (Daniel 9), and enough among Israel also admitted they'd sinned against God and changed their votes. Nota Bene: VOTING changed history, not good deeds. So God took from the remainder of the 490 years (950-586BC=126 years=the 40+70+7 pieces in Daniel 9) and crafted a new Temple Time Grant; contingent, on the Temple and Jerusalem first being rebuilt. That meant voting during the ensuing 140 years (measured from 586BC when God decreed the restoration, Jeremiah 25, Daniel 9:1-2); followed by more voting, over the ensuing 483 years. And the deadline for Messiah to finish, was the 1000th anniversary of David's death, our 37AD (revealed by the Dan9 math). During that time, the Temple would have to remain standing and in good service. That meant more voting. Then Messiah would come and pay; IF ISRAEL ACCEPTED HIM, there would follow the Mosaic Law's promised 57 years, which would complete the fourth 1050 from Adam and begin the Millennium in 'our' 94AD. Again, voting not good deeds, determine history. See how God 'replies' to Satan's good-deeds fruity notions?
Satan did manage to make Israel so anal about good deeds, he corrupted the very Levitical priesthood, itself. When Jesus was born, his cousin John, who would become "The Baptizer" (not "Baptist"), was a bona fide Levitical priest by descent. Yet God had John go out into the wilderness, rather than serve at Temple. When God orders you to disregard a law He set up (Levitical priests in John's family were required to serve at Temple), it means there's no way to obey it in form. That's how bad the Temple had become. Extra-Biblically, you can find out that many of the priests who served there were not eligible to serve under the Law. And if you read the Mishnah (which covers that first century's interpretation of the Law), all the anal pil-pul will sicken you. The Law had become a total travesty in practice, by the time Christ was born. Satan really won against the Jews, and continues winning to this day.
So the gross display of trying to destroy Israel through good deeds, versus the voting faith of a few among her despite massive and repeated persecution, ended with the Arrival and Exodus of Messiah.. and finally, with the Exodus of the 2nd Temple, leaving only a Wailing Wall and a denuded Holy of Holies — all in fulfillment of Daniel 9:26, right on time. Of course, this upgrade on Genesis 3 is the focal issue in history, still; we are post-Cross, waiting for Him to Return As Advertised.
So let's summarize the first Five Phases, as all their Themes come to a Head, in Phase #6. Notice the progressive, honing character of the issues, post-Fall.
Notice how there's not a lick of works in any of these Phases. Sure, there's a lot of Bible text on do's and morality, and of course one must be moral. But these are lower in importance. First Commandment is LOVE GOD. Can't Love God if you don't know God, and you don't love God if you won't Learn God, main theme in 1 John (very pointed and almost insulting Greek, especially in 1 John 1:6,8,10,2:5, 3:18, 4:1-17). So it doesn't matter how moral you are, if you don't want God. For God made you. To reject knowing the One Who Made you is the most immoral thing you can do, Numbers 14:11ff, 1 Chronicles 28:9, Isaiah 29:13, Jeremiah 6:19-20, Amos 5:21-22, Zechariah 7:5, 2 Timothy 3:5-7. People all too often relegate "God" to works and relationships with people, shallow observances and emotionality. That's just like a woman who marries a man for his money, not really interested in him. In short, the worst kind of infidelity is that of superficial fidelity, with no real love underneath. Sterile.
DAT Round #6, the Christ, Who Would Only Eat From God's Tree, God's Word, even though suffering maximum Unfairness of the Cross: 25 Chislev 4BC-30AD. Here we see that Love for God supercedes even what seems like the Most UnRighteous Thing God can do: make a Sinless Person into Sin for everyone else. And that, after allowing everyone else to try and KILL Him. Matthew 4 is the quintessential New Testament summary of Trial arguments on both sides: who does the doing.. God, or you? In Matthew 4, Satan's arguing that the Fairness or Niceness of what Father wants to give/do to creation, should have a Price; hence, the creature's own independent abilities ought to be utilized, and likewise Be Rewarded by God. Christ retorts each time that there Is No Price, for The Word Is Priceless (see also Isaiah 55): whatever Father wants, Christ The Man wants to be/do/have By Father's Making, not Christ's own making. Even, a Cross.
Main theme of this Trial Phase is that GOD RISES UP, Yah+qum, the 12th priestly course name occurring in the last week of Chislev, which contains Chanukah, His Birthdate. David invented the priestly courses (see 1 Chronicles 28:13). Each course is prophetic for the time it represents. Yah+qum means God will Rise up to Testify, to Win. Ties to the later Isaiah 53:2 (a Trial Witness verse, LXX's "enantion" stresses that connotation). So this Phase #6 was initially intended to be the Last Phase, fulfillment of all Promises communicated prior, Arrival of the God-Man Himself. #7 was to be the postscript of Tribulation and Millennium. As we now know, it didn't turn out that way. Let's examine what #6 accomplished.
God having defeated Satan's arguments about human good on a corporate level by the content of the Mosaic Law — which no one could fulfill, so Grace Alone Ruled — it was time now to vindicate the nation which was the poster boy of it. So now Her Savior arrives. All that remained, was for Israel herself to accept Him, at which point He would pay for sins, die, resurrect, come back and defeat the world. Israel's holidays depicted all that story. Passover was a prophecy of the exact events of His Dying Week on Earth. Like Pentecost did in days, Jubilee in years depicted the ensuing 50-year voting period for the world to also accept Him before He returned again. Tribulation 'repaid' His Dying week, so the sum of Jubilee plus Tribulation — known since David died — would 'bridge' to the final 1050-year Time grant in history, which hinged on Messiah Himself completing his Pay-for-Sins Task. The chronology was exact: He would have to die no later than 37AD, so would have to be born late 4BC, so to have the same 40 reigning years, as David had. He would be born on 25 Chislev, a date given His progenitor Zerubbabel in witty play on the day the 2nd Temple's foundation was laid, 357 years before the first Chanukah. You knew all but His Birth month and day, by the time David died in 963BC, based on David's age when he became king (30, see also end of Luke 3), the year David became king (two of them, 1010BC and late 1004BC), the year David retired from Kingship (970BC), and the year he died (963BC, per 1 Kings 6:1). The goal of all this exactitude was to give everyone time to VOTE. Because with His Coming, the Voting Period would soon be up.
Christ's Own Testimony in the Trial was the Most Important of All, here in #6. His Testimony is Love for God Defeats All Else, Is Superior To All Else, Because GOD Builds it. For as True Love grows, barriers shrink — even the barrier of the Cross did not separate Son from Father or Spirit. Omniscience always sees the Cross 'live', front-and-center, even though historically it happened long ago. For God is Timeless. So the Judicial Barrier Between God and mankind went tumbling down, theme of Ephesians 2 and Hebrews Chapters 6, 9. Ashes to ashes, the holocaust was fully burnt. Gladly. So God the Son Who Added Humanity to Himself, DEvalued even His Own Merit, Philippians 2:5-10.
Hatred, of course, can grow as well. As it does, it raises barriers higher and higher until at last, no amount of contradicting information, penetrates. Hatred, of course, thus needs its own expressions. So, look! Alternatively, you can substitute some other 'life' instead of Christ's, to keep on thinking — if you like masochism, that is. Satan deems living to see God, masochistic. Matthew 4 is a chapter you can study daily for months. So just look at some of Satan's perspective, in that confrontation:
Three Temptations Reveal Satan's Trial Strategy, Arguments.. and God's
Satan reasons with Christ, thus: after all, Father made Son starve for 40 days, right? So why not speak stones into bread? You're just as much God as Father, it's not fair He make Your Humanity starve. In Greek, 1st class condition of "if" acknowledges Christ IS God: you can only tempt someone to do what they can do! So, Satan's very nice and polite, using the imperative of entreaty. But Son's Humanity would rather Live On Word, than on His Own Divine Power to make bread. So great was the circulation of Scripture in His Own Human Head, that the subliminal suggestion to imagine eating (body naturally wishes the food mentioned, when that hungry) — even the biological reflex didn't scoot past volition to tap His Deity's Natural Power. Scriptural Recall Stopped It, Matthew 4:4. Now you see how the real spiritual life, works!
It's a Good Deed to feed people. Implicit in this Temptation is the accusation that God the Father, and hence the Son, are immoral because They don't use Their Power to feed the world; for Satan would, if he had that much power. Satan's use of the "imperative of entreaty", is Greek for an inferior urging a superior to take a better course of action. So that's a 'dig': Son isn't being good as He should be. Satan's hoping this dig will make Son angry.. and zap Satan into hell. Which, Son would be completely RIGHT to do! At which point, Satan wins. Good deeds are the biggest snares of all, and Satan of course knows this. Christ knows it better.
We Christians fall all over ourselves to give into the First Temptation. We are soooo busy trying to do stuff 'for' the world, neglecting the Word: like, Matthew 4. Satan laughs his head off. [Bible mistranslation is rampant, always falls to the First Temptation, rendering the original-language texts into urgings to do works for the world. Satan really guffaws then. The mistranslations actually REFLECT this First Temptation, i.e., God's head is cut off in 1 Corinthians 1:5's Greek, and man's is put atop! Matthew 16:18 cuts off the Lord's Head and puts Peter's on top! It's amazing. Thousands of verses, this happens.]
Again, a Good Deed is used to tempt. Isn't it good to save the human race? Won't they believe in You because you do something godlike — you know, come down on both feet, have trumpets or something. Or.. Die in a spectacular way? The method God chose of saving us is criticized here. Isaiah 53 had been out for centuries, so everyone knew the gist of how He'd pay for sins, by human deprecation leading to false conviction and execution. As Isaiah puts it in Isaiah 53:2, "lo toar LO" (not HIM, for crying out loud), "wa lo hadar" (no glory by OUR standards). That's what Satan's saying, and misusing Scripture, to boot.
We Christians can't give into the 2nd Temptation fast enough. We chop out Bible context right, left, and center. First Commandment goes unseen, but boy oh boy how we make an issue of sexual sins! Every verse we read as works, and the thousands of verses which command you to know Word and live on it, not on religion — we ignore. The Pharisees were quintessential good-deeders, but we Christians learn nothing from that. Pagans were all about emotionality and signs/visions, whereas we are supposed to test with Word — and we don't see all that in Bible, either. Or, we chop out whole BOOKS of the Bible in our penchant for legalism (i.e., those who treat Revelation as merely allegorical, thus chopping out half of the Old Testament which Revelation literally references). So, what with all our many works programs, soup kitchens, gold stars, stations of the cross, tambourines and Sunday-service choirs and bands, how-I-love-Jesus songs and flash, potlucks and all the rah-rah Jesus rallies: of COURSE we see the Virgin Mary below a Chicago underpass plastered against the girder, or in a cooking tortilla (Texas). One sighting near me was upon a tree stump fronting someone's yard; I see it's now festooned as a shrine with plastic daises. We sell God as if he were a circus clown, sheesh. I mean, it's really sad that a movie like "Sister Act" demonstrates how singing alone brings in a crowd. Word Teaching didn't do it, huh. [And in Bible translation, oh! Like Satan does with Psalm 91, in Bible translation we cut out or reverse the meaning of keywords or phrases, every chance we get! My favorite examples of these are all "huper" verses, "womb" verses, James 2:22 and 4:5, Genesis 3:11, Psalm 139:11-17. Too much to say about them, here. Other websites cover them.]
We Christians basically chop God out of everything, substituting people, leaving only His Name mouthed to make us feel good. Just as Satan's advocating here, we want Circus God. Christ knew better.
Note how in Temptation #3 Satan plays off the Lord's answer to Temptation #2, jump. The Lord's answer, quotes Deuteronmy 6:13. So Satan uses Deuteronomy 6:13 against the Lord. In Greek, "if" is in the second class condition, meaning Satan acknowledges the Lord won't 'worship': a compliment. But watch how Satan thus insults, by equating himself with Father and Son: God is worse than Satan, who can prevent both hell and Cross, by surrendering the kingdoms of the world to Christ. So Satan, then, deserves to be worshipped! Yikes!
Like Satan, we Christians can't WAIT to give into the 3rd Temptation. We want the kingdoms of the world, politicking day and night. We kneel to Satan's idea that visible control, wins. And like Satan, we love imagining ourselves saviors. For when hatred fully matures, it acts like love. The one hating has a martyr complex; everything he does is unrequited, and the world owes him everything for his sacrifice. [So too, Bible mistranslation reflects the 3rd Temptation with its emphasis on worldly behavior or action, so you get the impression you're SUPPOSED to take over the kingdoms of the world in order to defeat Satan. Bible thus has been used for centuries to justify political control in the name of Christ, whether it was the RCC, or the later state religions, Calvin's Geneva, the Puritans, Amish, Quakers, you name it. Incredible, how we misread our Bibles.]
See how the two 'trees' produce? Satan's tree-of-thinking produces masochistic martyrdom. Satan gets his rocks off by thinking he'll suffer in hell forever: that idea pleases him, he can spend all that time exulting over how he beat God! You see this mindset every day in the human race. So many people loving how they are victims. Every criminal thinks this way. Hitler's thinking was saturated with this mindset. The terrorists live on it. All eastern religions and cultures cultivate it, from time immemorial. Notice how it's the flipside use of messiahship.
But look at Christ's 'tree': if you don't live on the Word, you truly are masochistic. Why is Christ's thinking not masochism? because He gains something real, not a fantasy. Satan will spend eternity fantasizing he gained something. Satan loves thinking God is unfair, lives on that 'love'. People today emulate him by the billions, priding themselves on how much they suffer, making endless songs, movies, novels about their PAIN. But the Lord doesn't think like that: rather, Heb12:2 and Hebrews 5:8-9 show His Mindset. He suffered to get something, and got what He wanted: "I and the children you gave Me", Hebrews 2. Not, being alone in hell, telling Himself how good He is. Above all, what He gets is the rapport with FATHER, via the Surgery of the Cross — for God is Infinite, and Christ's Humanity is finite — what will bridge that gap of nature? As you'll see later on here in #4 of the "Trial Issues" section, the first problem of creating is that Infinity and finity are opposites, so rapport cannot be had unless Infinity solves that oppositeness. Which, Infinity does, by becoming Human, so the Infinite Truth can be poured into and thus cycle into the finity — which Unites The Thinking. Rapport is essentially, a unity of thinking, a sharing of thinking. All happiness depends on rapport.
But Satan wants to be alone, having rapport with no one — the ultimate masochist. The ultimate crazy person. For he cannot abide, companionship. No one else on the pedestal, but him.
So now you see the two 'trees' available to the human race, and how they play. So let's apply this Trial #6 quintessential proof, to our own lives. When you first believed in Christ, you believed in the Merit of His Work on the Cross, not your own. So how is it suddenly Christians think they must go hustling and working (theme of Galatians)? Aren't we in the same corrupt body as before we were saved? What, did the body suddenly become perfect? See how Christianity suddenly switches to the wrong tree, producing Strange Fruit? Though even in translation, Galatians and its companion passages in Romans, Ephesians, etc. clearly talk against works? Does the Bible forever go unread? Yep: we love being martyrs. Just like Satan.
So, what to 'do'? Well, what did Jesus Do? The Word: He Thought Word. So what Jesus Did, was Think. What Would Jesus Think? For only your head can 'do' Word. For, what your head does, is think. Think what a verse means. Study its words across Bible, to see what Bible says its words mean. Ponder, ruminate, talk with Father about, analyze, try to apply to your own life. Of course, all this brain function will just be hot air, puffing up pride, if you aren't online with the Spirit, so keep breathing 1 John 1:9: see that verse in context. Ephesians 5:18's mandate to be Filled with the Spirit is 'done' by using 1 John 1:9, and the way you know for sure, is that "katharizw" and "adikia", of the last Greek phrase in the verse, are pregnant Old Testament (LXX) keywords for cleansing a defiled Temple. So for the Temple of Your Body to be Filled by Him again, you name any remembered sins (purification from adikia also handles those you didn't know, didn't name, forgot about, etc).
As Christ Himself relied on the Spirit, so must you. Through His Power you thus monitor your own thinking, 1 Corinthians 11:31; you keep on looking at Scripture, 24/7, Philippians 2:5, Hebrews 12:2, Romans 12:2-3. Do you see how the Lord did it, in Matthew 4? Satan didn't stand a chance! Train for that high a level of ASSOCIATION. It's spiritual racquetball/ tennis/ football/ backgammon/ chess all rolled into one headgame. Hardest thing you'll ever engage in. 'Takes a lifetime to properly train, it's relentless, it's unglamourous, thankless, and you'll be prone to discouragement. True combat is like that. Defeat looks like victory, and victory looks like defeat. The Cross looks like defeat (see Isaiah 53:4-5)! So when you're weak, then He's Strong: 2 Corinthians 12:9-10.
So, Learning Bible is what 'doing' it means, says James in Chapter 1 (parallel passage is Deuteronomy 30). Bible believed (1st meaning in Greek of "faith") is the merit, it causes patience, it causes the works (example of Abraham, in Chapters 2), it causes the crown of life reward. For, the One Who Is King got crowned that way: "full of Grace and Doctrine/Truth", notes John 1. You believe Bible for the same reason you believed in Christ — due to Its Own Merit, not your own. Believing is all about the Object's merit, which is why you believe. [The absolutely craziest things I've ever heard in chat are the ideas that 'believing' is a) meritorious, or b) not mental. First, it's impossible to believe if you don't see justification (rightly or wrongly); second, only the soul thinks, and believing is a thought which accepts the proposition facing the soul, because it makes sense to the soul. That's how you learned to read, to eat.. everything you know, you had to believe, to 'know' it. Even if someone told you the cow jumped over the moon and you didn't believe cows could do that, you would believe you heard it. Else, you couldn't even remember. Psychological Defense mechanism called "denial" deep-sixes what you disbelieve, with the express purpose of preventing recall.]
While these paragraphs about learning Scripture sound like 'work' to the human brain, clearly God who saved you without works, has no intention of your doing work to learn this Scripture. Which we know for sure is true, since all we do is 1 John 1:9 and thus God Fills Us — just like He used to do in the Temple (Holy Spirit did that, Isaiah 63:11-14, compare to Eze10:3ff w/1:12ff) — because you are part of the Temple now, Ephesians 2. So you now get filled up with Scripture, theme of Romans 8. Pregnant with it, even (Paul's obsessed with begetting topics, just like Isaiah was, since begetting the Word in you is the whole purpose of Bible).
Ok, this isn't too hard to understand: the woman who gets pregnant got it done to her. She can't do anything to make that fetus come to term. It's a process native to something she did not create, but just is. So yeah, it's a royal hassle to go through the process, but at no time does she work. Rather, the whole time, she is helpless. So we do suffer, but for a reason — and like Christ says repeatedly, what woman when she gives birth, but forgets her past suffering? Worth it! is what she concludes.
So Worth it! is what Christ says of His Own Cross, what Father Did To Him, making Him pregnant with sin, Isaiah 53:11, 2 Corinthians 5:21. Hence, Isaiah 54:1! Not, sterile masochism. That's the Trial #6 Proof, theme of Book of Hebrews. God's fruit tree bears even from sterile (i.e., sin) 'seed'. Satan's, bears only vanity. So Worth it! is what we Church can learn to shout, if we learn Bible in God's System. [Isa53trans.htm and Isa53.htm cover a deprecated translation of Isaiah 52:13-54:1; Hebrew and Greek only is ISA53.RTF, a Word doc parsed to show the meter.]
Full-Circle, Exodus II, God's Sequel and WrapUp, from 30AD onward. After the Session, the story of This God-and-man's Resurrection likewise completely disrupted the socio-political structure of the Middle East, and eventually — the world. So many counterfeit gospels made, everyone wanting to cash in on His Fame. Really rocked the world from top to bottom, side to side. Whole religions had to retool their tenets (i.e., Buddhism) in order to keep societal stability (mostly by copycatting). Rome, of course, would eventually be undone by this "Way" Person, though variations of "Rome" would continue to rise and fall. Whole new societies and religions would piggyback onto this "Way" Person (i.e., Islam, Mormonism), so the ripple-effect of That One's Life, would render the REST of history. Everyone's been responding or reacting, ever since. So, Enquiring Minds, wanted to know more about That One! First-hand, no longer by grapevine. Hence was born the New Testament, even as the Old Testament was born: of an exodus, and of yet another wacky people who flourished under it. For "Christian" and "Crazy" really do begin with "C" for a Reason.. ho Logos, the Reason for History, the Sanity of History.. if you LEARN HIM, that is (Romans 12:2-3, 2 Peter 3:18).
The Old died on the Cross because He fulfilled the Old (theme of Hebrews 7~10). The One Who Paid for it, set up a New Will (ibid, but start in Chapter 1). Hence, The New Testament's coming-out party took a lot less time than the Old Testament predecessor: the latter took about 1400 years, because God picks writers based on their spiritual growth. By contrast, the New Testament took about 60 years to be written; only ten people wrote the New Testament; so by 96AD, the Good Book could close. [Paul did not write the Book of Hebrews, see Hebrews 13:23 — Paul had been executed, Timothy released. Not sure who did write it, but it's clear the book was written in consequence of Paul's execution in 68AD. See Hebrews 13:23.] Not because some Councils some hundreds years later 'pronounced' which were Divine Writ, but because the Content Of The Disclosure Proves Itself. On Trial, even today, verse by verse, in the mind of man. 'Amidst a whole universe of competing writ, then and now.
Anyone who contends that some bleeping Council or religious body decided what's Divine Writ, can't read it. For if you COULD read Bible, you'd know yourself what is and is not, His. God doesn't need man's help, ever, and He Testifies Directly. The idea that some religious body 'determined' what is and is not Divine Writ, is mainstream arrogance of the worst kind. Instead, just breathe 1 John 1:9 as needed and ASK Him, as you read. You'll have to do some legwork — God won't spoonfeed. But you'll know. Wanna-be bible books prove themselves false in maybe 10 minutes. Verse-by-verse inspection takes sometimes longer, in the original-language texts. With computers this is much faster, but it doesn't take long to see, even if you did it by hand. God will not be silly. Ok, there goes the seven 'deutero-canon' books, out the window! All of them slapstick and insulting-to-God, never mind they also screw up dates and facts. Nuff said.
So the Main Theme in DAT Round #6, God Rises Up (3rd week Chislev), ended with "God Knew and is Dedicated, Devoted to Destruction", the 2nd and 3rd priestly course names in Nisan for the Week He Died in 30AD, fulfilling Daniel 9:26. That One Who Beat Satan in the Wilderness went on to Successfully Pay for All Mankind's Sins, and thus defeated Satan's contentions about Merit (Hebrews Chapters 1~2, 9). PassPlot.htm has a blow-by-blow chronology in its Division #2. The gross display of trying to get Him killed at the wrong time versus His Own Dependence on Father and Spirit even through the imputation and judgement of all sins, answered once-and-for-all, Satan's objections. Note how Satan again plays on what God ordains. Here, the Promised Timing. For it was Satan who motivated Judas to betray Christ that night: Judas was a believer, so this was influence, not possession. All the sweeter, to use a believer to betray. Satan thinks that if he defeats God on His Own Terms and with His Own Believers, that's a sweeter, surer Victory. When exegeting Matthew 4, my pastor explained Satan's strategy of playing to strength (lessons 800 et seq in 92SD). Goes like this: if you can defeat someone's strongest suit, everything else is but a mop-up operation. So in Matthew 4, Satan attacks the Love of Christ for Father and for us, baiting Him to do good deeds in the very name of that Love.
So too, with respect to Timing His Sacrifice. Passover Week was a Promise of that Timing. Defeat that, and the entire basis for Israel is defeated. So the goal was to Kill Him Before He Could Pay For Sins, DURING the Very Time God Ordained. Failing that, to make Him so near-death, He couldn't think, since Isaiah had long told everyone His Thinking would pay for sins. Failing that, to get Israel to reject Him. Satan succeeded in this last goal, only. [Re Thinking paying for sins in Isaiah 53: yaskil in Isaiah 52:13, im tasim asham naphesho in Isaiah 53:10, me amal naphesho in 53:11, lamawet naphesho in Isaiah 53:12, not to mention all the thinking clauses like heheli (v.10) and holi (v.3), the two uses of dakah (v.5 and 10), between 52:12 and 54:1. I counted 21 such thinking functions in the chapter (which really begins at 52:13 and ends at 53:12, look for the demarking samex in the Hebrew). Maybe there are more than 21.]
Well, Satan's also defeated Christians from properly learning the Timing, even through today. Amazing, how not one movie made about His Passion, ever admits Bible teaches it took FOUR DAYS from His Arrest through His Crucifixion. Christ was arrested when He should have been: true 10 Nisan, nominally 14 Nisan, 1st day of Passover by the yet-uncorrected, Jewish calendar that year. Christ was executed when He should have been and before sundown on true 14 Nisan, nominal 18 Nisan, just as the Law required. God Obeys His Own Law. Passover was a promise, a prediction, of how His Death Week would 'play'.
The ineptitude of Biblical 'scholarship' here is total. Absolutely no excuse for it. Of course, we still call it "Good Friday", lol! Like Jonah, In The Grave Three Days And Three Nights + Rising On The First Of The Week, how much plainer can Bible verses make it? So we mess up how long it took Him to GET to the Cross, even as we mess up how long He was in the grave! We can't count to three, even — so of course we don't see Bible plainly tell us that it was FOUR days from Arrest to Crucifixion (arrest&Sanhedrin, Pilate, Herod, Pilate, typical one-event-theme-per-period, Greek style of narration).
Three is three, not two or five or ten. Three days and three nights is not allegorical, figurative, or less than 24 hours per period. It's absolutely astonishing how some 'scholar' people twist literal calendar days into something else, to justify the putrid lie and worse ineptitude about What Day He Died. Just admit the centuries-old misreading-Bible error, fix it to Good Wednesday, and move on! Satan's too gleeful to allow that. Man is too petty, scared of admitting he's wrong — just like Adam in Genesis 3! — to do that. So we're stuck with the blasphemous "Good Friday", and no one even cares. Surer proof man's utter disdain for the Word, and of Satan's tactics and success in this Trial, you couldn't ask for.
With the Completion of DAT Round #6, Trial Should Now End: Chief Witness Successful, theme of Hebrews Chapters 1~2. But it didn't end. For Satan DID manage to get Israel to reject Him when He came. Israel had voted for His Execution. So the 5th Trial Phase Issue of Israel Accepting Her Messiah, didn't complete. #6 was successful, but there's this holdover issue from #5, Israel's acceptance.
To 'answer' Israel's Rejection and thus 'close' Phase #5 of the Trial, Christ Unilaterally Voted To Pay for a yet-unborn entity, Church — before He even went to the Cross. For that would necessitate Father imputing sins of yet unborn humans, to Christ. Why did Christ vote this in Matt16:18, ratified in John 17? Well, Time would have ended, if He hadn't.
For He is a Groom, and Israel was supposed to be the Bride. This is a distinct covenant, separate from the others given Israel. The others were unconditional, housed in Abraham, Moses, David. This one antedated Israel, and was a Battlefield Royal Patent Contract between Father and Son in eternity past, Psalm 110. It required a Bride. Israel was the first Betrothed, a long-established promise contingent upon her acceptance of Messiah: Ezekiel, Hosea, Isaiah, and pretty much every prophet spent many lines of verse encouraging Israel for this purpose. Yet when Messiah came, Israel didn't accept Him. So, Matt16:18 was born, and the replacements would be sought among the Gentiles. Surprise method of fulfillment to long-known Old Testament calling-out-of-the-Gentiles promise! Israel played Vashti, so Church would become Christ's Esther! [This would be a great topic for a dissertation, especially to dispel the occasional question of whether Book of Esther should be in Bible. The wordplay in the names of these two women is phenomenally-apt. Zechariah 1 ties in: Israel will still be protected and Delivered As Promised, but through a different myrtle, get it? See also the wedding parable of Matthew 22, and Luke 14's dinner parables. Really pointed reference to Vashti banquet and Esther marriage banquet. Pretend this thesis is correct and read Matthew 16:18 ~ Chapter 24, ask God for where else to look for corroboration. All topics in those chapters are related to the switchover, and act like a cross-examination +deposition, proving why it was right to seek a 'new' Bride. Awesome. See also Paul's grafting-in analogy in Rom11. Main purpose of John 15~17, and Book of Hebrews is to explain the switchover.]
Christians, me included once upon a time, get confused about our relationship with Israel. Book of Hebrews helped me enormously, when I heard my pastor explain key exegetical points. But even in translation, you can trace that there are Two Kingships, two covenants, two priesthoods; one is from eternity-past, antedating creation and therefore Israel, Psalm 110 and Isaiah 53:10-12, 1 Timothy 2:5. This first Kingship is Battlefield Royalty, and is given for Defeating Satan in the Trial, main point in Hebrews Chapters 1~2. This Kingship required a "Bride", and Israel was first offered that opportunity, viz. the frequent 'adultery' complaint against Israel, in the Old Testament.
However, separate from the kata-Melchizedek King-Priesthood ordained in eternity past, is His Jewish Kingship Contract, as Son of David. That second Kingship is an unconditional promise to David (2 Samuel 7:12-13, Galatians 3:16), so Israel cannot lose it. She voted against both Kingships during His First Advent, but that only delayed His Coming to take the Kingdom, as He explains in Matthew 22-24. Book of Hebrews essentially walks the reader through the different covenants of both Kingships, so that then and now, one can see God has not abandoned Israel; but her covenant is in abrogation status (passim thread, most visible in English in Hebrews 7:18-28, 8:7, 9:15-17, 10:9). So until Church is Completed as Bride, the Old Testament covenants will not be deliverable (Hebrews 11:1,6, bookended by 11:40). We implement the New Covenant alongside Israel, Hebrews 8:8-10:17 during the Millennium, of which this is a Prepare the Bride stage. Just keep breathing 1 John 1:9 and read the Book of Hebrews, asking Father often for clarification. That's what helped me, adjunctive to listening to my pastor's patient explanation and exegesis (Book of Hebrews exegesis, plus 1992 Spiritual Dynamics lessons beginning around L.800 through 1100).
Bottom line: Church is not Israel, has its own covenant and Royal Priesthood, Royal Patent. Two walls, two covenants, two kingships, two priesthoods. We are used as a 'bridge' to rescue Israel, and will be protecting her during the Millennium by ruling Gentile nations. God is the God of Freedom, so that means He will not use His Power to prevent war. So there must be a setup of ruled nations to secure that peace. Only the Church kings will be ruling (though I'm guessing Church will be used to staff the Gentile kingdoms as well). Perfect rule, but it's a joint thing: Christ rules the world through Israel and through Church, during those thousand years (i.e., Revelation 1:6, 5:10).
So Satan's trying to abort Church. Cruelly, he uses "abortion" to do that in our day, yet another Revelation 17 politico-religious aka "harlot" ploy, one of hundreds he practices upon the world and Christians, daily. No soul life is in the womb, Bible is absolutely possessive of the claim that Only God Makes You A 'You' At Birth. It's a frequent refrain in the OT, but all "womb" verses are reverse-translated, in English and most other translations I can read. So notice Satan's fine sense of irony: if he can bang the drum on the false idea that abortions kill humans-in-womb, he aborts Church from growing up. For it's impossible to grow up spiritually, if you are 'loyal' to false doctrine. Anyone can be saved by believing in Christ, John 3:16. It's an altogether separate matter, to mature spiritually. People don't even mature humanly so long as they have stunted ideas they never grew past. That's even more true, with childish or false ideas of Bible Doctrine. Saddest story in history, the spiritual arrest of Christianity in our time. Political Crusading is always used to do this, and blatantly false doctrines are always touted. Satan's not stupid. We sure are. So long as Church does not finish maturing, the Rapture can be delayed or manipulated to force a Mistrial Verdict. More about Mistrial follows in the "Trial Issues" section, below.
As a result, DAT Round #7 commences, the "REST" of history (Hebrews 4): 30AD forward (overlaps with Israel #5 'Phase' from 30-70AD). His Ascension and Session (Ephesians 4, Hebrews 1~2, 9~10) Are To Be Repeated In Us. Rapture is an Ascension; Judgment Seat of Christ (aka Bema), where the 'rewards' are given, is a type of the Session. We Are Body, so we get the same spiritual life He had, and everything else is paradigmal. Including, crosses. Including, preserving the human race. Here's a basic checklist:
- The Lord Invented A Brand New Spiritual Life For Himself, while down here. Israel never had that life, nor would anyone else before or after Church. Church Alone is legated that Life. Basically, He had to invent a new type of spiritual life to endure the Cross, and He invented it ad hoc out from the Mosaic Law. His Thinking as a result of successfully completing that Life is what we inherit, as Bride. Book of Hebrews covers all this, and it's a central teaching thesis of my pastor since 1985. The "MISTRIAL" section in "Trial Issues" below will say more about this invention, but it's most extensively covered in LordvSatan3.htm and its subpages. We are a unique entity in history, because He is unique in history. This is the fundamental reason we are different and derive our Precedence SOLELY from Him, Heb12:2.
- Had the Lord not elected Church as Bride, we'd all not be here. We don't replace Israel; she never accepted the Brideship contract, so there's nothing to 'replace.' Pages 2-4 of TenWaysThisTimelineDiffers.doc walk you through the time math, so you can see how Time ran out for her. Church can't replace, what was never acquired by the alleged replacee. Church can't replace, what has no time allowed to acquire.
- Hence, this Bride has the characteristics of Her Risen Husband, inasmuch as she was to be formed after He inherited His Kingship at His Session, thus beginning Psalm110's implementation. So she inherits all He is and has.
- Paul was informed of the above Session legacy, and was sent out to the Gentiles for that reason; for, his fellow believing Jews would not listen to it, preferring their good-and-evil use of the Mosaic Law (Acts 15ff, Galatians 2). Still, all believers between Pentecost and Rapture would be In Church, no matter what race: just believe in Christ (Galatians 3). Philippians 2:5-10 notes the fulfillment of what had been promised since back in Genesis 3:15, As Precedence For Us.
- Thus God keeps His New Covenant Promise to Israel, as well: just in a 'sibling' way. TWO walls, Israel and Church (Ephesians 2). So Church gets the Bridal-Contract promise, since it was conditioned on Israel's acceptance, and the latter refused the Groom. Since all the other covenants were unconditional, they will still be conveyed to Israel — during the Millennium, as was always promised, from Abram forward. God Never Fails To Keep His Promises. This is a crucial point, in the Trial. Crucial to understanding prophecy: no other covenants were given out, and none remain. Hence history effectively ends with Church, and is contingent upon Church. (See LvS4a.htm for a much fuller explanation of this and the following paragraphs.)
- This new legacy, being as it depended on Christ's Own Choices and execution of His Spiritual Life, was not foretold in the Old Testament. So, it was a "mystery" to them. So it's NOT their contract. Greek word "musterion" doesn't really mean unknown — instead, it means unknown to those outside the group. Satan, of course, wants to make this Bridal Legacy a mystery to everyone. To view Christendom's history, it's clear he's largely succeeded.
- Something old, Something New: this Brideship contract ISN'T what Israel would have gotten had she accepted Him, as her acceptance had to be pre-Cross. But He died for BILLIONS OF EXTRA PEOPLE owing to her rejection; so the contract terms themselves, are different: Father determined the terms DUE TO that Extra Payment. So our contract is based on His POST-Cross Success, which cost far more; so has much richer rewards than could justifiably be offered Israel (i.e., John 7:39, we get the Spirit without limit, as Christ did). A quick listing of 16 major oppositenesses between Israel and Church was tabulated in "Our Bridal Contract". That's why Paul had to write about it. It was unknown prior, because it did NOT EXIST, pre-Cross. That's why Paul caught such flak, too, and people today still divide over what God had him write, as if what he wrote was a contradiction. Maybe someday they will learn to read, lol. No, not a contradiction, AN UPGRADE. Because, we inherit based on a Bigger Payment Which Might Not Have Happened.
- Thus all blessing comes from the REMNANT (usually translated "rest" also, lol) who are in on the mystery (i.e., learning Scripture, Hebrews 4:11-12), and thus everyone is given a 'rest' (or 'stay') from judgement — logistical time to wake up and get in on the mystery. So the rest of the human race, needs Christians to thrive and grow up. Because, the rest of the human race is outside the mystery, having elected to not believe in Christ, so does not want a relationship with God, so cannot get blessing from Him. Love never coerces.
- Trial History comes full circle with Church: Last Bride for the Last Adam. Writer of Hebrews classifies this Church Age (term in Hebrews' Greek) as the Seventh (directly and allusively in Heb1,4-10). [Wordplay is phenomenal: "rest" is "seven" is "swear/oath" — all those Hebrew words are alike. So "remnant" is another word used in wordplay of Hebrews 4 (playing on "rest" and "promise" and "remaining") to show how the Preservation of Mankind is Effected through the New Priesthood Founded by Christ, us. (Hebrews 7 - the word "church" is used in Heb12:23, dramatically).] John the Lover, aka Apostle John uses homey words like menw (playing off the Lord's speech in John 15, and prayer in John 17), and "beginning". For, in the beginning which was not the beginning of creation, God restored the earth in 6 days; but on the 7th day, He rested. And the woman, the bride, wasn't made on the 6th day, except that she was 'in' a rib of Adam. So now, the Bride for the Last Adam, The Man who finished in the 6th 'day' of the Trial; Who rests, having Finished (tetelestai!) the Cross; so now, the woman is made from His 'Rib'! So the "riv" (Hebrew, court case) Completes even as from the beginning it was intended (Eph1). For This Bride will be Endowered, not merely endued. With Groom's Thinking (ibid through Chap5)! Paul waxes euphoric in Ephesians, basing the whole book on Euripedes' play, Ion, which is about begetting a whole race of people (the Greeks). Yep, full-circle!
This Seventh Trial Phase, being as it was only born due to Israel rejecting the long-promised Bridal Contract, has no certain end-date. Hence the Rapture, and hence it's Unpredictable. For the criterion for completion, is HOW MANY in Church, not how long, not what historical events happen when. For, Christians Voting to Grow Up in this unique Spiritual Life is a volitional issue, not an extrinsic one (i.e., not based on historical events). So, when this Church began at Pentecost (roughly June, 30AD), no one could know how long it would take for the Christians To Grow Up In Sufficient Numbers Such That The Voting Would Complete (Greek, big Bible keyword: teleiow, pronounced tel-eye-OH-oh, means to complete, fulfill, finish, end, mature, "perfect" in legal sense of perfecting a contract). Historical events are always irrelevant, because they are ALWAYS THE SAME. For any generation has enough people in it, to be the Rapture generation. Believers who look for historical events to help them tell if the Rapture is soon, are voting for Satan's side in the Trial. They can't read the Bible at all. God love 'em, these are very sincere people. Yeah, and sincerely wrong. They are so fascinated with the flashy events, they will not grow up spiritually, so will only be IN the Kingdom, rather than inheriting one as a king under the King of Kings. It's heartbreaking.
First century Christians were much the same. Back then, a transitional overlap of covenants/contracts applied. Technically since Israel had already rejected Him, she had no more time, but Church was inaugurated. So, 30-70AD, judgement warning played against Israel 'during' Church. In Matt16:18 the Lord told Peter that He would build a "church" (assembly, body) upon Himself. He does this by completing his Pay-For-Mankind Mission. So the parenthetical insertion of Church into the Jewish timeline to SAVE it (and fulfill those promises), means that every characteristic of the Jewish Timeline must characterize Church also. Part IVa of the "Lord vs. Satan", covers this topic in great detail.
So of course, people back then were obsessed about when the Rapture would occur, even though it could not be predicted. Under Israel's covenant, you were REQUIRED to predict for over 1000 years, ever since David died. Post-Cross, all that was off, Acts 1. So, well.. people didn't easily quit. So, post-Cross, everyone expected the Tribulation to begin either 64 or 70AD, since it was still possible that enough Church believers would Finish Testimony Of Church by the end of the traditional 40 years that would play as a 'house' for the seven years extra shortage, Israel's repudiation had caused. So 70 or 77AD would have been the 2nd Advent, followed by Millennium. Most Christians got out of Jerusalem before those deadlines (i.e., Peter went to Antioch and then Babylon). Each deadline, came and left. By the time the post-Temple epistles were written (John, Jude, and probably Peter), the elongation of history was known — but now what? Until God closed The Book with Revelation, everyone just waited. After Revelation, everyone knew what to expect, but not, how long. The pre-Cross deadlines had been 87 and 94AD, following the Davidic timetable. So even that late, some people expected the Rapture to occur. When it didn't, well.. they were disappointed.
Since All Prophecy Is Double-Entendre And Dual-Usage, it was easy to doubly match the Revelation Greek-Drama imagery to the Old Testament (i.e., harlot in Revelation 17 meant Fake Church, as "harlot" in Old Testament always means religion). One 'match', here's what to look out for generically until Church completes; another match — how the actual Tribulation runs, for that last 7 years remaining to Israel (Revelation 4:2ff). Church is to be used to deliver Israel, so the prophecy belonging to Israel paradigmally stamps the characteristics of Church: to help Israel and everyone else Know What Time It Is, Daniel 9:26. Since the second usage of the same prophecy is literal for the people Israel, there is no Church in the official Tribulation, but Satan will pretend there is, Revelation 17. See? two audiences, two time periods, because "the times of the Gentiles" are Two Times (ages, epochs, covenants, dispensations): one of which, is the official Tribulation (Israel the Nation is not a 'client' of God again until the 2nd Advent).
Thus the Church period is a parenthesis in Trial history; or, as my pastor likes to call it, "a dead spot". This, only because Israel rejected Messiah; so now "Esther" is being sought. So it's an exodus: who will come out of 'Egypt', the world Satan runs? So it's a Diaspora (backdrop for Book of Esther, a real analogy to God's deliverance of Israel, especially in light of Temple destruction, see also Matthew 22,24): who will stay behind and be punished, who will leave and be preserved? (See also Jeremiah Chapter 25ff.) Paul depicts the period as a pregnancy, in Romans 8:11ff.
There are two types of body counts God uses, and both must complete before Rapture can occur. First, there is the countdown of the Witnesses to be called into the Trial Docket. As you may know from even secular law, before a Trial begins the opposition must be given advance disclosure of the evidence, so there will be time to refute it. This includes depositioning the Witnesses, which means there is a List of them. If one of the Witnesses fails to show up, or doesn't complete in the docket (i.e., is discredited), then that could cause a Mistrial (covered in "Trial Issues", below). That's what's being done in Revelation 7 with respect to the Trib Witnesses, an ADVANCE roster, all Jewish (listed literally by tribe, leaving out Dan, double-portion to Joseph). There, we see the list. You see another list in Heb11, and the first list is in Genesis 5+11. Since the Church is not predicted or predictable, there's no numbered list given to us. But Satan (&Co.) surely know. Else the Mistrial would have occurred, time would have ended.
Second, the actual Church subkingdom sizes and compositions, constitute a Priestly Divine Thinking Dynamic For Father. Since Christ is King-Priest kata Melchizedek, the goal is to develop a Royal Priesthood whose Thinking reflects Him, so that Father enjoys what He Forever hears. So, there will be a hierarchy of Thinking, which will result in a societal hierarchy of many kingdoms which last forever. He is King of Kings: so, these will be a Federation of subkingdoms which exist forever. Obviously they will not all be equal. There is a best size for everything, and in aggregate a best number and composition of kingdoms, with the perfect synergistic balance between rulers and ruled. That's an ever-changing value, since more are added to the Body each day, so the numbers of rulers needed to properly 'care' for them, is in a kind of flux. It's a personnel issue, and one which must be perfect throughout all eternity, as well. Again, the Lord is the Ruler of the Universe, but He delegates His Rule. After all, most believers elect intimacy with works and ritual, but distance from His Thinking Written in His Word. The rulers made the opposite choice. So they will be directly ruling those who elected distance. So the perfectly-happy mix of that, is a dynamic only God could know. We always have free will and won't ever sin again: so compatibility is of utmost importance.
So here we are in 2007, still in Trial Phase #7, the actual Rebuttal Argument Phase Of The Trial. See Ephesians 1:10, "summing up of all things"; same idea is the theme of 1 John, with 1 John 4:16-17 being a climactic statement of God's Completion Purpose; verses through the end of 1 John 5, being on the Trial effect. Part IVb of the Lord vs. Satan lists some of the easier-to-see verses like those just mentioned. All else following Phase #7, will be post-script. Eight is the Biblical number of both (double-portion inheritance?) completion, and new beginnings: for the "week" of man's weakness, is over, then.
Writer of Hebrews knew God's Orchestration for Time Accounting System. When Christ died, it was the 8th 490-year Blessing Time unit from Adam. He had to die 64 years before it ended, because there was no time left. So when the author of Hebrews drolly writes about Rest and Rescue and how Time itself was designed around Him (Hebrews 1:2, Greek, usually mistranslated), he's looking at the 8th 490 and making puns. GeneYrs.xls plots out these 490-year segments and their larger 1050-year 'house' from Adam forward, so you can see the orchestration. Year 4136 from Adam (yellow center column of the spreadsheet) shows you the math of His dying early, deadline of Daniel 9:26 being met.
So what are the Issues in this Trial Phase #7 which we Church Now need to know, and daily remember? [The very frequent keyword "Age" in the NT, is often mistranslated. It's shorthand for "Church Age". Same, when "Church" is used, but without the word "Age" following it. Just as "Israel" means the TIME of Israel as well as the people/body, so also "Church" means the "time" of Church as well as the Body. We say "World War II" and automatically everyone knows what TIME that is, even when talking about it as a whole body of experience. So "Church Age" was not invented in the 19th century, but by God. Funny how blatant, common-sense things we have no problem understanding in secular life, suddenly mystify us, in Bible.]
Trial Issues
Our Trial Testimony Now (Bible keyword) in this Final Round (#7) is to Complete God's Answer to What Constitutes Merit? But, at the Highest Spiritual Level, Christ's. The Lord's contention remains that only God is good enough, because only Infinite Good is good enough. And, Church will reflect the final installment of that contention's Testimony: some of Church will reach "Pleroma" (Ephesians 3:19), a witty term for being so Full with God's Thinking, the believer himself bears God's children, so to speak. Hence the very many sexual innuendoes, particularly in Paul's epistles. Paul, the only perpetual virgin. Heh. [You won't find many of these innuendoes in translations, for they are largely fuzzed over, euphemized, 'clothed'. Yikes!]
MISTRIAL
Here in Round #7, Satan contends that our legacy from Christ of His Own Spiritual Life (i.e., stated in Heb10:9), will be rejected by Christians in such vast numbers, God in effect harms the human race. That's grounds for a MISTRIAL Verdict. Which human race Satan will consequently 'save', instead. The wellbeing of the world is in the hands of believers. God blesses or curses the world due to believers, a policy since Adam's Fall. So the higher the spiritual-life standard, the higher the blessing if it is met; the higher the cursing, if it is not. To whom much is given, therefore — the Royal Spiritual Life of Christ — the more is expected. So argues Satan, since the human race didn't accept the lower versions of the spiritual life; for God to impose the same Standard as for Christ means more rejection, hence more cursing to the world. All because, God Unilaterally Chose This. Christ chose it in Matt16:18, ratified in John17, and Father granted it, per Ephesians 1. So Satan contends, God is Guilty of being Unjust, and a Mistrial should be called. [This section is a summary. "Mistrial" is covered in more detail in LvS4a.htm, LvS4b.htm, LvS4c.htm, and LvS4d.htm. Those are the four main subpages of Part IV of the "Thinking" series, extremely long.]
Satan's always argued thus. You see him do it in Job 1 and 2, Matthew 4 — whenever the Judge is accused of being unfair, that's a claim that a Mistrial should be declared. We moderns didn't invent jurisprudence: God did. Again, Bible is chock-full of legal Trial language, usually fuzzed-over in translation. "Satan" means "opposing attorney", a title, not a name of a person. So he's always claiming the Judge is Unfair, that the Judge Bribes (i.e., Job), the Judge harms the human race He pretends to want to save (Matthew 4). Here with Church, the mortal contention is that God Claims Victory Based On Evidence Which Doesn't Exist. For when Christ Committed to Pay for Church, there was no Church. So if even ONE soul in the future doesn't come to exist, God has pretended Evidence which doesn't exist, and therefore is Guilty of Abuse of Justice. That would force a Mistrial Verdict. For payment on the Cross would be a sham, which taints the Cross itself (payment made or allegedly made for a non-existent person); second, the non-existent person was used as evidence in the Trial. Sham evidence, then — so, Mistrial.
So how could Righteous God approve it, and how could Christ invoke it? Well, as we saw back in the Overview and Round #6 sections, Christ is first God and as God, made a contract with Father to be "King-Priest" kata (according to the pattern of) Melchizedek, which Book of Hebrews explains. This antedated Israel, and it's a Battlefield Royal Patent for Defeating Satan in the Trial. (Obviously, God being Triune and Omniscient, hence Foreknowing, before decreeing to create They would first contract with Each Other, what Each Party was willing to do.) This Kingship required a Bride (Ephesians 1), and initially the offer of Brideship would be to Israel, and then to Church. Ok: but when the Lord actually took on Humanity and came here, would He in His Humanity, vote that too? He'd have to pay, so He has the Right to Vote on whether He WANTS to pay. That's what you see Him do, in Matthew 16:18. He's the Petra of the Old Testament, and that's the Name He uses to Vote Yes: "ON THIS BEDROCK" ="Petra" in Greek, pointing to Himself (not bleeping Peter, lol) — "I WILL BUILD MY CHURCH." [Proof yet again, of putrid 'Biblical scholarship', that they can't tell the difference between feminine gender (Petra, in the verse) and masculine gender (petros, Greek for Peter's Aramaic name Kephas, in the verse); putrid, that they don't even bother to research the uses of Petra in Old Testament and in 1 Corinthians 10:4, in which Paul allusively quotes Matt16:18 to show how Church faces the same testing and perils as the erstwhile betrothed she replaced. People miss His Huge COMMITMENT in this verse — without which, we'd all never have been born!]
Israel being the first-offered Bride, would have to reject Him before any subsequent offer could be made. Which, she did. To warn her of that, He announces the Formation of Church. Again, this is a foreknown thing, but Israel should have the Right To Vote on it: God never forces an outcome, but does disclose it in advance. Because, this is a Trial. The last year or so of His Ministry down here was spent explaining how they could avoid that outcome, and what would happen if they rejected Him (at least in Matthew 16:19- Chapter 24, and John Chapters 6~17).
In Trial terms, Christ invoked the eternity-past contract with Father, and Elected That Father Determine Who The Bride Would Be, John 17:20-21. This invocation was also justifiable, since the Gentiles had long been promised rescue (i.e., Isaiah 52:15). So, they would be recruited for Bride, analogous to the way Ahasuerus sought for a replacement of Vashti. Of course, unlike that Persian king, God still wants Israel, so if she also agrees to the recruitment, she is in Church, even as any goy in the Old Testament could have been part of Israel, by converting (i.e., the 4 million or so converts during the first Exodus). Now get this: for Christ to unilaterally vote for a replacement Bride, necessitates paying for BILLIONS MORE PEOPLE on the Cross. John 17:20-21 is open-ended. Father decides who WILL be born, how many, etc. and then imputes all their sins onto Christ while He is on the Cross, even as all the past peoples' sins were imputed and judged on Him. So Christ upped the Bride Price, which He as Groom has a right to do. That this Bride is future, only helps Satan, so Satan can't object — and he didn't, initially. Satan didn't believe that the terms of the new Testamentary contract would but facilitate him winning, in the Trial. And he was right. For it remains true, that if even one person paid for in advance does not come to exist, then God has abused Justice. So then Satan would go free — him, all his demons, and all unbelievers, too. This is God's Way of trying to get all those beings to understand that nothing defeats God, even if He makes every condition go against Himself. There's no gerrymandering, ever. God doesn't like cheating, Trial or no Trial. (God doesn't sin because He DOESN'T LIKE it. God never has a negative reason for doing a thing. He only does what He LIKES.) [Sigh: another putrid contention in theology is that somehow God is 'constrained' by His Attributes to stay perfect, i.e., because He's Infinite He somehow cannot change, which of course is a flat lie. God wouldn't be Omnipotent if He couldn't change. He will not change, because He DOES NOT WANT to change; so He will not sin, because He DOES NOT WANT to sin, ever. Infinity is qualitative, not quantative, as my pastor so often likes to say. Which is obviously true, because duh, the universe exists. Were God quantitative, there'd be no 'room' for anyone else.]
Concomittantly, Satan argues in this Trial Phase #7 that The Most High raised the bar too high for Church believers, when He mandated they get the same Royal Spiritual Life, as Christ had. Oh, now Satan's our defender, better than Christ Our Advocate (1 John 2 and Hebrews 2, 4) — get it? Satan's reasoning goes like this: at least in the OT, man had stuff to do, and lots of visible evidence on which to base his faith. So Now, absent these, with only a thinking spirituality, no one will want it. (Never mind, that during the Old Testament Phases, Satan complained that God was cheating, by using visible do's and manifestations, blessings: viz, re Job.) Therefore, God Harms The Human Race, By Not Giving An Easier Blessing Basis. There was only One Messiah, Satan complains, but You, Elohim, claim You can make A Whole Body of messiahs Out From Him. (Yep, that's exactly what "Pleroma" means! Trace the word and its cognates/synonyms in the inspired New Testament Greek texts! Focus especially on passages like Luke 8 & John 17, in Gospels; all of Ephesians and Hebrews. Awesome stuff. Oh: include telos and its morphed forms, plus the cognate verb and synonymals. This tracing alone will demonstrate more proof about the nature of our spiritual life in HIM, than is describable!)
Satan reasons, if God's argument is right, and Creation is Free, why should it be penalized for Disagreeing with an Impossible Standard? For divorcing Him? And how right IS it, to set a standard Only God Can Fulfill? Particularly, with reference to Church? It's tantamount to sadism. And, by the way, there was No Ratification of the Bridal contract by Israel — which resulted in her being rejected — but oh, this Church which also isn't Ratifying the Contract, is guaranteed? That's Rigged Justice! And, Israel had a much lower level of spiritual conditions to fulfill — so how is Church going to fare better? Which therefore begs the question of whether the entire Nature of God's Standards for relationship are even equitable for humans. In modern jurisprudence, this is calling God "arbitrary and capricious", the worst accusation which can be rendered. Greek word is "adikia", abuse-of-justice. Devastating logic, too.
Remember, back in Phase #5, God defeated Satan by means of the Mosaic Law. And Why? Because even God Subjugated Himself to the Law, so the 'capricious' nature of rule Satan had long authored, suddenly was quite unattractive to people who'd been bullied by it for millennia. So they voted with their feet: our modern democracies are a direct result of these 'feet'. But now, whoa — God is the one who's apparently capricious, after all. Reversing Himself, raising the bar and expecting man to fulfill what the Mosaic Law taught man he could never fulfill. Looks pretty bad, huh.
Israel was essentially divorced for rejecting Christ, in that she's no longer the Betrothed, as a nation. So how is it, Satan contends, that the Most High can divorce and be right, but I and my demons cannot divorce and be right? Isn't the requirement that Free Will Consent be FREE? Yet why should it be penalized for freely choosing NO? Of course, this was his argument in his own initial trial, back before man was made. So he's reprising it here. Has been, ever since Adam.
The criterion for the Rapture is that the Number of the Body, completes, so that NUMBER is guaranteed. It's a Body Count, spiritual-maturation criterion (Ephesians 4:11-16), not the time-based criterion applicable in the Old Testament. So to get bodies in Church to keep rejecting Christ, is Satan's #1 goal. Satan only sponsors gross sin to make moral sinning look holy. It's the moral sinning which truly divorces God, in favor of self-merit. Satan's success here with Church is phenomenal. That's why we're 2000+ years into Church Age. That's why our theology is so putrid that we can't count to three or four; why we call God Infinite but then 'constrain' Him by His Attributes; so of COURSE we can't rightly date His Birth, Death, or Exodus, nor can we rightly read kindergarten Greek gender of Petra versus petros in Matthew 16:18. Voting for Satan makes one blind, but fantasize self as holy. Holey, that's what we are.
For Christ also invented His Own Kingly Spiritual Life during the First Advent, even as He invented Church. The Mosaic Law wasn't high enough for the Spiritual Task given Him. Heck, the Law couldn't even save you, but could only prove how inadequate you were (another main theme in Hebrews). So He had to invent a Far Higher Life down here, to succeed at the Cross. It's His Invention which we get as a Legacy. These principles are threaded throughout the Book of Hebrews and Ephesians. Greek word "Archegos" in Hebrews 12:2 means Pioneer. Inventor. Hence Leader. He was plerow, not pimplemi. Also 2 Corinthians 5:17, we are kaine ktsis, new-in-species spiritual beings. So again, Christ not Israel, is our Precedence and Author. As my pastor likes to put it, "He is the prototype, tested the spiritual life to 20,000 fathoms", meaning that we won't have to go that 'deep', so it's reliable. [Central contention of my pastor is that Christ invented His Spiritual Life during the First Advent. Lessons 800 et seq of 92 Spiritual Dynamics are on this topic, running for about a year (300 lessons or more).]
So just imagine Satan's chagrin when Paul hit Pleroma, 2 Timothy 4:7-8. And probably Peter, John, who-knows-how-many others that first century. For again: what can be more meritorious, than the Thinking of Christ Which Paid for All sins, Isaiah 53:11 (bedato yasdiq clause)?
The spiritual life for Church is indeed far harder than for Israel: sufficient numbers of believers have to grow to the Pleroma Level of Ephesians 3:19, 4:13 to Constitute Acceptance. That's His Own Maturity Level, the Highest Standard of Spiritual Growth ever given a group of believers in all human history, before or after "Church". KJV translates Ephesians 4:13 rightly. It's positively shocking. My pastor has taught this doctrine for decades. So wouldn't the chance of Satan winning, be higher than ever? Conversely, wouldn't the potential gain to a believer, be higher than ever? "To whom much is given, much is expected." A Bride must be of sufficient status for Her Husband. But would Father do anything less? [Again, this is a central contention of my pastor, beginning in 1985: '85 Ephesians, '91 Israel, James 4 and '92 Spiritual Dynamics (series are in chronological order listed), go through the extensive exegesis to show how true it is that we have the highest spiritual life in history. Bible is really adamant about it, in the Greek — especially 1 John, Hebrews, Ephesians, Colossians. Shocking.]
So what is this Higher, Royal Spiritual Life which we inherited, and why is it such a big deal in the Trial? "It's about Confidence in Word! Christ's Thinking, On Trial! Evidence, Unseen!" That's my best translation of Heb11:1, which tries to ape the Greek meter in the verse. Greek "Hupostasis" is used in Hebrews as a moniker for Christ. So the "substance" of the Trial, is how Substantially Word is in us, how we are standing under Him (puns intended). This Standard is the hardest kind for any group of humans in history. It's a Thinking War. So it's a big deal, because we can be more intimate with God than any other group of humans in history. That also makes it harder, since the differential between God and us, is so vast. For the more you love God, paradoxically, the more you can't stand yourself. Satan's banking on the differential being so upsetting, Church won't complete. What he always underestimates, is Love. And the more you know God, the more you love God, and from that comes your integrity, Job4:6. Which He builds in you, precept upon precept, Romans 5:5.
- As a Royal Priest before Father, your job is to think and be pleasing to Him, 24/7.
- 100% Intimacy with God, 24/7. That's the Standard. For that's how it was.. for Him.
- So every thought and action is preceded by, "What does Father want?" because you want to subordinate your ideas, to His.
- That requires constant looking up,
- constant listening,
- constant thinking Toward Father,
- a kind of endless 'conversation'.
- Constantly you vote by monitoring your thoughts to conform them to Bible you know.
- It's not just about avoiding sin, but about an arsenal of thoughts you can think since Father hears every one of them at all times.
- For the Quality of your thinking is constantly heard.
- Knowing this would freak out the average believer. But think: the Lord's every thought FIRST went up to FATHER, for approval.
- Additionally, you're constantly evaluating stuff in your life,
- watching your tongue
- and attitudes
- and monitoring your thinking for temptations and sins so you can use 1 John 1:9 if needed.
- Like the Lord in Matthew 4, you're being constantly hit with input from the world and the ever-present media blitz of TV, radio, people's voices, whatever.
- And you must "bring every thought into capitivity", 2 Corinthians 10:5.
- All the while, you are ruling on how you think. For, you are in practice to become a King.
- So you must learn the principles in order to make the rules, not be a peasant spoonfed the rules.
- No rituals, no works, yet always working.
- Using Bible, living on it, you yourself are literally inventing how you live before Father. Just as Christ did.
- For this spiritual life has only one ritual (the Eucharist).
- Morality is a floor given, not a ceiling.
- Rather, you're aiming for Total Subordination to the Word, in every thought you think. Personal wants are way secondary.
- This life is entirely secret. The last thing you want to do is tell anyone you're living it.
Whew. It's exhausting, and it's 24/7, and until you have enough Doctrine you don't live like this, but are rather in the childish struggles of body urges and neediness for worldly compliance, fit-in with people, etc. But as you age spiritually, you do discover that Bible running in your head is a constant "rest" (Hebrews 4, objective being stated in Hebrews 4:11-12). [Interesting how just after those verses, He becomes the focal point as Precedence, to explain why "rest" is resting in the Word of God (a common moniker for Christ as God, and Bible is His Thinking); rather than, the Old Testament system of sacrifices, etc. For the discussion starts with where He is Now, after verse 12; then goes back to His origin and appointment, result of New Priesthood Because New Covenant, so we derive from Him, not the Law. Brilliant, the way Hebrews is written!]See, His 'fathering' of our spiritual life, is not at all like Israel's (main theme of Book of Hebrews is to explain the change). 1 John 1:9 (Psalm 32:5, 66:18, trespass and sin offerings) to live on God's power, not your own (just as Christ did, viz Matthew 4:4, John 3:34, 7:39, unlimited-Filling plerow sample verse, Luke 4:1). It's always and only the thought that counts. And what a killer life. So look at the paradox. All those exhausting thought control and monitoring functions, trying to move your body at the same time? Yet, all you are doing, is voting! The Holy Spirit runs the recall, the comprehension of Word, so as you keep on "practicing righteousness" as John puts it (in 1 John) it's a kind of spiritual racquetball. He makes you become proficient at it. So it becomes natural, instinctive. Still exhausting, but you come to love it. And as the hits increase to your soul, you gain a better appreciation of what it was like for the Lord to be lacerated with incoming sins. The sense of overwhelm, helplessness, even shame. The increasing love for Righteousness — true love, not the kind where you pat yourself on the back — all these, 'gang up' on you. As you age, you feel LESS worthy, not more. Because, your soul is being enlarged with Word, it becomes progressively your focus, and you stop regarding self. Further aging makes worldly stuff less attractive, smaller. Suffering has the paradoxical effect of making what's pleasant, unattractive. If you can use it for Righteousness, fine; if not, well.. you'd rather do something else. A genuine preference is built up. A Preference for Word Above Name: above your own.
This is how Christ could be sinless and stay sinless.. forever. This is how we can become sinless, yet retain free will, forever. The more Truth in you, the more you understand it and think it over and use it in your life, the less attractive will be, anything else. Freely. It's not an angsty thing. But you have to want God for Himself, just to know Him, or you'll never grow out of the childish phase of insisting morality is spirituality. Kids need do's and don'ts. Adults have better reasons for doing what's right. Like, it's more enjoyable, than doing what's wrong. Takes a lot of truth built up, before that happens. God doesn't sin because it's not attractive to Him, even if there were no 'threat' of losing Godness (pretend). God doesn't avoid sin because of some threat. You won't either, as you grow in this thinking.
Satan cannot defeat it. Yet all you do, is vote. No works whatsoever. God runs the whole thing, and you're voting for it, because you want it. So, you're getting what you want. That's not works, that's blessing. Israel couldn't get this spiritual life. Christ had to invent it, down here. And that's His "hupogrammos" legacy to us (Petrine term, 1Pet2:21). Quite a paradox, huh.
So, Now (Bible keyword for Church "time"/Age/Dispensation): will enough of us, a nation's worth, accept? Well, more than one nation's worth, since His Title is King of Kings. That means many kingdoms under Him, not just one. So the Trial Evidence Bar was raised on the numbers, too. Acceptance means many 'dots' of voting according to God's System; each one counts, but you need many of them to cross the Successful Testimony Threshold. For Now, because Christ Rose, and we Get His Spiritual Life, the "acceptance" bar is higher: enough Pleroma to rule all other Church believers who don't choose to be grown that high. Else, you get knocked out of the witness box. Bible's terminology for this problem varies, but the "endure" and "remain" verses, the many warnings to stay the course, "I come like a thief", etc. are all about staying in the testimony through completion ("the end", Greek telos). The Testimony Before God And The Angels, never mind people down here on earth. The Royal Spiritual Life is a THINKING BEFORE FATHER. Invisible, to people down here.
People down here are preoccupied with earthly things, Romans 8. So they are always thinking about how they compare to someone else, what they want or don't want, stuff they want to own or get rid of, politics, how good they are (or how bad), how good or bad someone else is. Bible is used to beat up self or others, and spirituality is either dour legalism or emotional high rah-rah activity. "God" is just a designer label for ego. Ergo all the good deeds are really self-promoting, with eyes at the politically-correct lowered level. The utter hypocrisy, pettiness, jealousy and self-delusion are unbelievable. And God has to hear all this JUNK, 24/7! Peasants who should be royal. And the unbelieving world is even worse, what with its many vauntings of truly slapstick notions of 'god' or humanism, deifying man as usual. Never mind, we all have to PEE. Since God gave each of us a soul at birth, and we only take the next breath because HE WILLS IT, um.. it's pretty gross that we paint Him as Sugar Daddy or Petty Judge, or tell ourselves we're the gods, instead. Pretty immoral of us, huh.
You don't lose salvation, but you can lose "inherit the Kingdom" — an idiom of kingship. To be a king, you have to bear the ruled. Kinda like being a mother: so you must become Pleroma, childbearing. Usually translated "fullness", it's a pregnancy-type of 'fullness'. So full of the Seed, you can bear kids, is the cultural root of the term, used in Greek lit for when a god impregnated someone. Wordplay is very witty in Romans 8, where being Filled with the Spirit gets you Filled Up with the Word so you are pregnant and bear kids (all sotto voce, all covered up in translation). In any organization even here on earth, there is a hierarchy of THINKING. Those at the top, must think about and set policy for the whole organization. That's a type of kingship, parenting. So you are here to be trained to think like a King: if you finish that training, you inherit a kingdom. Meanwhile, as you train, you will be in the Witness Box: generally, not until you are in the last stage of spiritual growth, Pleroma. For you are being tested for whether you SHOULD be crowned. If "yes", then your thinking is "begotten" in your kingdom, since you'd be setting the rules, etc. So your kingdom becomes your "child", so to speak. The Pleasure of Kingship is to serve Righteousness. To love it with every fiber of your being. So 'children' can be blessed and they too can learn more about this Pleasure. That's how a Cross can become the Most Dearly Loved Task. That's how He thinks, and His Thinking is to be begotten in His 'children', to the extent they consent. Well, a king-sized consent is needed. One moment at a time, precept upon precept.
So, one believer might become Pleroma enough to have a "crown" (remember, He's King of kings, so there are believer kings) of — say — 20 million believers in eternity. Some other believer might grow farther in Pleroma, so is a higher King — say, Paul — enough to justify a 'kingdom' of a billion believers. It's not equal, but it IS keyed to Capacity To Rule. Just as, the Messiah Himself, rules everyone. So it's about How Many Rulers Are Enough to cover all the bodies IN Church. LvS4b.htm's first 50+ printed pages cover this numbers criterion in much greater detail.
The Whole Body is to be Completed. That means, some of the Body rule; others are the ruled. Not all believers want to go through what it takes to get to the Pleroma stage: and, those IN that stage, aren't equally willing, either. So, like the Lord says in Luke 8, the 'crop yield' varies. So, the kingdom sizes, vary. So, "King of Kings" is a federation, such that the connections are optimal. Perfect, even. For, as we see even down here on earth, some nations are large, some small. What works for a given nation, varies. Larger in Heaven is ipse better, but note that what is right inter-person, might warrant a smaller size. So, what Best Blesses, is God's standard. Hence some kingdoms work best small, others large: for, in the final analysis, what's "better" is what makes for the most RAPPORT inter-person. (More about Rapport follows, below.) Hence, not all kingdoms will be of the same size. Quick analogy: the US works well as a big nation, and would really work badly, if cut up into 50 (or fewer) 'nations'; but Lichtenstein's 'personality' works better in its own size. Doesn't mean the US is better than Lichtenstein. Small is not worse, not better, of itself.
Now here's the killer: YOU are your own practice kingdom, currently. By learning how to rule yourself, you learn how to rule a whole polity of any size: "faithful in little, faithful in much" is true because the STRUCTURE of faithfulness is being built in you. Hence it's God's Will, per Eph1 (since eternity past, escrowed) that Every Believer Be A King. That's why the Lord warned about not "losing your crown" in Revelation. YOU HAVE A KINGSHIP: you can only abdicate it, like King Edward did, by divorcing your inheritance, by falling in love with something or someone else. Guess who it would really be (hint hint, "devil"). Ephesians 1 is on that, the "every spiritual blessing" clause. See, if you can handle every spiritual blessing, then you get every material blessing, to express that. Every material blessing is a full-spectrum definition: all the high, all the low. Like Paul would say, "I know how to be abased, I know how to abound." You get both. You'll want both. Christ is Both, in One Person, which is why you'd want both, too: "for the purpose of being conformed to His Death", Paul writes in Phili3:10. "Filling all in all" being the goal, end Eph1. All the high, all the low. For Omniscience, is all High and all Low At Once. So to know God, you need to know High and Low. The Lowest, was the Cross. That's why Christ wanted to 'go' there. And as one ages in Christ, one wants what He wanted, Isaiah 52:13 and Isaiah 52:14. God loves CREATING. He likes judicially matching up highs and lows, somewhat akin to how an artist likes to craft a painting, a sculpture, or an engineer likes to make a car, plane, building, etc. God therefore wants everything to be free to be what it is, high or low, good or bad — and then HE CRAFTS the Righteousness and Justice and Beauty, out of it ALL. He loves doing this. So we needn't feel bad about being puny.
So: pretend for the sake of argument that every believer grew up to Pleroma so he was crowned. There would be no subjects to rule! You'd be a 'kingdom' of only one person! So what? All the wealth expressions, highs and lows of them (wealth is much harder to deal with than poverty, don't kid yourself) — well, you'd have them anyway! Kingship is a matter of self-control and the wealth to execute Righteousness and Justice. So a small polity or no polity to rule, doesn't matter. So a big polity to rule, doesn't matter. And it won't matter to anyone in the eternal state, that someone else is superior. Yet, while still down here.. man, the more the better, huh.
Sounds good, huh. So why do 99.9% of Christians opt for Satan's Brother-Foot Churchinanity, which blatantly advertises Revelation 17, right down to the bleeping colors (scarlet=politics, purple=religion)? Thus the Pleroma-class of believers, is still too small, and that's why the Rapture hasn't happened yet. Sad, huh. Satan (&Co.), of course, are "ROFLMAO" (ask someone in a chat room what that acronym means). Satan (&Co.) thus pitch Church as you're-holy-if-you're-puny; "God" is this painful or boring or capricious slapstick character who makes statues cry, virgens in tortillas, suns spin backwards, or other circus tricks. You know: like you'd tell a dog to "go fetch". And of course you're expected to do these outrageously stupid things like light candles, torch yourself or some building, rid the world of untermenschen. That way you're living like a PEASANT, and never discover the Royal Patent God put on your name from the very day you were born. Since any unbeliever can also become a believer, the same Kingship Award is potentially available to him, too. So it's real important that Satan (&Co.) deceive us with a Sugar-Daddy, Petty-Judge mindset about God. Wow, are they successful at this propaganda, or what?
So the potential for Mistrial is real. Rapture can be required for the wrong reasons, as well as for the right ones; wrong TIME due to believers not voting. For the backdrop is that Time Itself Can Be Cancelled At Anytime. Mirroring.htm covers that; a more succinct presentation is in the (2-page) Appendix of TenWaysThisTimelineDiffers.doc, or the popup note in cell A2 of GeneYrs.xls (same note in both places). As those sources show since Adam's Fall, Time is conditioned on a believer being spiritually matured enough by God, to receive an award of Time in either a 490-year or 1000-year unit. The whole world has lived off these time grants, which run like a relay race from: Adam to Jared to Enoch, to Noah to Abraham, to Isaac to Jacob to Joseph, to Moses to David to Temple to Christ. Just think: about 4000 years of pre-Cross history justified by only TEN people, through David; 11, through Temple. (The Lord completed in Time but His Time Award is the Millennium, so is reserved at present.) A mere 10 people plus the Temple via David, carried the world for 4,000 years. And that rule still remains: we are only here because roughly five or seven people post-Cross (Paul being the first) were granted Time due to their super-spiritual maturity. So if that award cannot be granted, Time itself ends.
Satan's angling for that result. It's a whole lot easier to make that criterion fail, than to stop the bodies in Church from forming. If too many believers are too negative for too long, they must be disciplined with capital punishment and brought home to Heaven in shame, 1 John 5:16. Enough, and it would be a Rapture at the wrong time. Enough, and the negative votes against Time itself, can force a recall. So if at the wrong time, before all these past-paid future people come to exist 'as previously advertised', well.. then it's a Mistrial. So if he can stop Time on juridical grounds, then the promised number of souls/Witnesses cannot even be born or brought into the Witness Box, so it's a Mistrial.
WASTE
Next issue: Satan doesn't "get" that any difference between Infinite and finite, is hellish waste. For God to elect to create, is to elect Hell for HIMSELF: the hell of living with inferiority forever. Perfect or no, how much rapport can you have, with a begonia? Fish? Babies? Children? For the Rapport GAP between Infinity and any kind of finity, is far bigger than even the rapport shortage between you and your dinner fork. Would you have more rapport with your fork were it perfectly made of finest, pure gold? No. And why is that? Because your fork can't hear you, can't enjoy what you enjoy as you enjoy life. Neither can a begonia, a fish, a baby, or even a child. There's too big a gap in appreciation. So your relationships with your fork, your plants, your pets, and smaller people, become quite restricted. It hurts, in fact: the requisite compatibility, isn't there. So the relationship is a huge WASTE. One-sided. Of course, God is happy in any relationship: but we are not. So, just as you can't have rapport with a fork because it is too small, we can't have rapport with God because He is too BIG. So, it hurts to even think about Him, for most of us. That's why we consider the Bible a kind of waste, something we only kiss or keep on a dusty shelf, thump or use to bludgeon other people.
Hence the problem between Infinity and finity, however 'high' a creature each of us may become: we are SMALL, with or without sin. The shortness of finity is too vast (Romans 3:23, 2nd prong). That's the primary reason why Son Became The Truth in His Humanity, so He, despite His Finity, could have Total Rapport With Infinite Father: and it required A Cross to get that far. Much more about that topic will unfold a bit later on down the page. "Christ's Combat on the Cross" link in LvS4d.htm also deals with this topic. Surely, owning even all the universe is too small a prize for such a big payment. Father would never let the Only Humanity even go to the Cross, were it not for the Oneness Gain between Them. The only way Sinless Humanity can know Sin — a category of Omniscience, therefore necessary to know for Oneness — is to be imputed and judged with sin, on the Cross. He trained for that. It worked! So we get what He used to TRAIN, so we too can get the Oneness He prayed for, in John 17. So you gradually Learn Waste: how to 'waste' yourself on Him, 2 Corinthians 5:14-21. Great legacy, this. Totally the opposite of how the world thinks, how Satan thinks. This topic of "Waste" is extensively covered in the Thinking series' Appendix webpage (SatStrat.htm), the "God's Paradox" link.
Here's a quick way to get a grip on this vast difference between Infinity and finity: the latter has a 'body' to it. Subject to time, space, even the soul is a type of 'body', in that it has a perimeter: your thoughts only extend in any direction, just so far. The 'scope' of a person, so to speak. This 'scope' is what makes for compatibility and incompatibility. It's not an intelligence question, really, but a personality — how you choose to BE. So, we all choose to BE, different. Or, to some extent, alike. Where different, sometimes the differences are pleasant or unpleasant; so too, if alike. Compatibility depends on the 'scope' of the person reaching beyond what he finds pleasant for himself, to another. Trouble is, if the beingness you reach out to is not willing or not able to respond, the relationship is hellish. Even, when reaching out to the varying facets of personality within yourself, as Romans 6-8 explain.
We all have problems with certain people. Imagine two guys, one hooked on sports and the other, on the violin. Pretend for the sake of argument that each can't stand the other's passion. What do they have to talk about? How long do you think they can chat? How intimate can they be, in their friendship? Not very. Same with two gals, one hooked on how she looks, who she knows, what she ate last night. The other, hooked on Gibbon or string theory. Will they have much in common to discuss and share? Nope. Deeper, two souls which see life differently and believe differently about God, have even less in common. And what's the scope of thinking, in the petty soul? Very small, indeed.
You, for example, are soul and body; you think with the former, and you feel with the latter. If you are a believer, you also have a human spirit, which is why you can even learn Bible (and even then, you gotta use 1 John 1:9 or all you're learning, is hot air). So, then: think back to some time when you were in a lot of pain — didn't everything but the pain, get blocked out? All the rah-rah-rah thinking you'd learned didn't operate, did it? Whatever goodies you had, didn't compensate, right? And why? Because the body cannot learn the way the soul does. Because, the body is alien to the soul. Romans 8 is on this fundamental dichotomy. It's not just the sin nature, it's the limitation of one kind of being, versus another: here, difference between a finite soul and a finite body. So now you have a base of appreciation for what a hell it must be on God, to Elect to Create.
GOD ELECTED HELL FOR HIMSELF. That's one of Satan's biggest complaints in the Trial. God, loving Righteousness as He does, refuses to have anything 'be' except FREEDOM. It's not righteous if it's not free, even if that means it's BAD. Satan contends that's fine if GOD wants to be a masochist, but He should not impose on His Creation, the same standards. But God says any other, lesser standards are UNrighteous. So the Trial is essentially about the validity of His Contention. Notice Who is really on Trial, here: it's not about sin.. except God's! Again, SatStrat.htm's "God's Paradox" link covers this Trial Issue in great detail. Point here is that in the Trial, Waste is Tested. Do you waste yourself on God.. or on Satan? You are always doing one or the other, whether you know it or not. We puny humans are therefore encouraged to think ourselves great, in which case we waste ourselves with that arrogant fantasy like the woman did (and later Adam), in Genesis 3. Oh yeah, eating some fruit, lighting some candle, building some building, being elected President 'counts' as righteous! LOL. Notice that these things are not bad in themselves. Notice also that you can well argue they are all good deeds. Yeah, but they are Not Righteous, theme of Romans 4. The arrogance is to overvalue them. Which we routinely do, since at the very marrow of our bones we know we are puny, and seek to relieve that condition. Advertisers count on arrogance to sell products, i.e., if you buy the same sneakers a star basketball player uses, you too are a star.
God has another solution to our puny state, if we would but vote for Him: to pour His Son's Thinking into us. That topic comes up later in "Rapport", below, and is the main topic in all 'my' webpages (most notably, DDNA and Thinking series). SHARED THINKING makes it okay to 'waste' yourself, for LOVE wants to waste itself. Hatred, always wants to waste someone else.
God is Infinite, so His Personality, His Beingness, is Absolute: no beginning, no end, no limitation, no restriction. So He chooses to BE, Absolute; that's why He told Moses His Name was "The Self-Existing One", in Exodus 3:14: the Ineffable Name. [Well, there are multiple ways to translate that Name. Very witty.] So, think: He Wants All, Bad Or Good. He Wants To Reach Out To All, Bad Or Good, Because The Scope Of God, Is All-Encompassing. So the second He creates, whatever He creates, is limited. Thus, totally incompatible. And the desires of whatever creature created, will likewise be incompatible, limited. Absolute Love, doesn't want limited anything. So will rather Pour Out Infinitely, to 'marry' even the most wretched.
Of course, He could just make us all perfect little Stepford wives, every hair in place. That's not freedom. Given the choice between Freedom and meeting His Standards, He'd rather impose His Standards on Himself, and extend them to us. Sure, it's unRighteous not to meet those Standards.. that's why there's a Cross. That's why the post-salvation life is a Thinking Training more grueling than any works ever on the planet. Thinking paid for sins. At the same time, we puny never will be as big as Christ, for we won't choose to grow that far. No matter, we're free to become as big or as small as we want, the Same Holy Spirit grows us as Grew Him. Forever. Which means, the Standard is Only Fulfilled in Christ, and all of us are like pedazos, little reflections of Him, in aggregate a mosaic. Love never coerces, never gives up Freedom, and wasn't shorted, either.
Never shorted, but ever shorted. Love doesn't mind that. Love loves FOREGOING. So on the one hand, the price had to be paid, and was. On the other hand, God didn't need it to be 'happy'. It was a mechanism for GIFTING: Son to Father, Father to Son, Spirit to Both of Them, Both of Them to Spirit. All that, will be covered in #4 of God's Trial Answer, below. Point here, is that Waste is Constant. That drives Satan crazy, because he hates. Because if you love, you love to waste yourself. Father 'wastes' Himself on Son, and vice versa, as just noted above. We are the happy beneficiaries of that. Because the Godhead are wasting Themselves on Each Other, it is not a compromise that we are forever short. They love us with the same Love as they Love Each Other. "Love is the Integrity of God!" my pastor shouted in May 7, 2000 Bible class. At that point he'd spent his whole life, and especially the years since 1996, teaching the Nature of Divine Love, revising and correcting that teaching many times, always refining. Yeah, that's it: Love is the Expression of Sovereignty; all other Attributes are 'passive'. More about this is in the first half of DueDisclosure.htm.
So, that same Integrity Love is to be built in you. When you develop into the final spiritual maturation stage Bible calls Pleroma (child-bearing, pregnant with His Thinking), you will be WASTED. It's to demonstrate the Inviolable Love of all those Bible Doctrine deposits in you over a lifetime of living in God's System, basically learning and living on Bible under whomever is your own right pastor). You will be seen as a 'loser' to those in your periphery. There are three phases of this Evidence Testing (my pastor's term), roughly analogous to Christ's: a non-public phase (like Matthew 4, covering the same issues), a public phase (public can be small or large, but is still analogous to His Public Ministry), and finally, a public-yet-private, hybrid dying phase (analogous to the Cross, the payment being invisible, but some of the suffering, visible). Paul went through these three phases, too. Any believer who matures into the Pleroma stage does. Via listening to his classes, I've 'seen' my own pastor go through them (though for years I didn't understand the data well). He's dying now, so of course I can't see what's going on inside him, as indeed no one can see inside another person's soul (so we couldn't see what Christ went through, either). Lots of people think my pastor is abandoned by God, which discredits what he taught, doncha know — well, that's what Isaiah said would happen to Christ, Isaiah 53:4. So the same thing is supposed to happen to each of us, if we keep on keeping on in God's System. That's the test: Waste. So know now that if you keep on being in the spiritual life with God, it will get very bad, then nice, then bad again. You need practice in both, just as Christ did. We are not our own. More about this Waste Evidence Testing is in LordvSatan3.htm's "2-3-4-5 Evidence Testing" link.
RAPPORT
Ergo, Satan doesn't get it that the issue isn't Merit, but RAPPORT. And the only way for Rapport to exist between God and creature, is for GOD to pour His Truth INTO that creature, and thus make the 'scope' of the creature, bigger. More about how this pouring-in of Truth works, will be explained as you read the page: for it is the fundamental mechanic of the relationship and purpose of our lives, down here. Just as it was, for God and the angels. Same mechanic, because all souled creation, faces the same problem. The point is, to have RAPPORT means to have SHARED THINKING. So to get Rapport with God, you need to have His Thinking in You. As His Thinking grows in you, the Gorgeousness of Him is so vast, all else becomes much more unattractive, especially the self. So it's a challenge, to live with the self-which-never-measures-up. So in a way, you're electing hell, if you're electing to know God.The differential in natures is such that experientially, it's a hellish experience. But He's so Gorgeous, you learn not to care that it's hellish. That's the Testimony of Christ.. all the way through the Cross.
Back in eternity past, when it was just God and angels, Satan being the highest, came to realize that God (the Son) was saying to him, Look, if you want Rapport with Me, you gotta Elect 'hell' like I do. Satan couldn't abide that choice. He was the Guardian of the Throne, Haylel-ben-Shachar, Son of the Morning Star. To say that the Morning Star elected hell, was too much. Masochistic. Satan just couldn't acclimate to the Truth that the gap between Infinity and finity, IS hell. Because, Love wants to go to hell, because Love is innately foregoing. It's an Outlet, for Love. And God, Is Total, Infinite Love. Therefore, Sovereignly Elects Hell for Himself. Satan couldn't accept that. So, is still arguing against that election, now: One hell or another You elected, Most High. I elect a different hell, in that case: NOT YOURS. Hence, his arguments in the Trial. One can readily empathize.
We humans get to decide on the same question, as God Himself did; as Satan (negatively) did. As Christ (positively) did. That's not a blasphemous statement, but His Statement, Matthew 22:42: "what think ye of Christ?" For, at our end, it's the same hellish choice. We are not compatible with God, which is why there was a Cross to enable compatibility through getting His Thinking. But, first issue: what think ye of Christ, to Believe He Paid For Sin? Then, many many what-think-ye-of-Christ decisions, to GET His Thinking. Then you have to learn to live with the huge differential in Beauty between Infinite Him, and puny 'you'. Moreover, everything else in your life also becomes progressively puny, as your soul becomes bigger: so it becomes harder to live with what's becoming SMALLER than 'you'. So you'll find a whole lot of alien 'flak' hitting you from the world, from your own body, from your own soul, from Satan (&Co.) (though you won't necessarily know it's them hitting you).
That's the 'cross' you bear, if you choose to learn Him. No other way around it. Christ wasn't kidding when He said that if you want to follow Him, you gotta take up your own cross, and this Compatibility Fight is it, baby.
If you want to know God intimately and hence have Rapport with Him, you must be made much bigger than you are. It hurts; not because God would have it so, but because hurt is native to the process of growing. The promise of the post-salvation spiritual life is that you can be Grown to Christ's Own Level, Ephesians 4:13. It's not hyperbole. Why should God settle for a Lesser Standard than His Son? Really, someone should put a warning label on Bibles: if you want God, it's Open Surgery, Hebrews 4:12 to realize Ephesians 4:13 due to John 10:34. God could zap! all this. But that would gerrymander freedom. So instead it's line on line, precept on precept, scalpel on machaira.
This struggle to Grow in Him plays at all ends of the spiritual development spectrum. You'd think that if you learned Him, life would be a 'piece of cake': Oh, I get it now, I don't want to sin that sin anymore; I don't want to do those good deeds anymore — because they're not attractive, anymore. The Holy Spirit via Doctrine He pours in, has revealed the ugliness, to you; and now as a result, you don't want them, anymore. So you'd think you'd stop wanting them, because after all, You know the Doctrine now! LOL! Guess again! You'll still catch yourself sinning the same sin, craving the same good-deeds ("dead works", Hebrews 6 and 9), satanic plan! See what Paul says about coveting, in Romans 7. Even, and especially with Truth cycling in us, we remain as weak and helpless as the day we were born: see 2 Corinthians 12.
So Satan (&Co.) want to 'help' you have more hell: "Room 101" of Orwell's famous book, 1984. The objective of torture is to break down the will of the person under it. Whether it's to extract information, or to demoralize, the one running the torture, is out to break the victim. Whether it's mental torture (especially in intimate relationships, intended or subconscious), physical torture, withholdings, deprivations, etc., the objective is always to break the other individual. The body is the weakest part of the human being. It has every kind of need, and since the body needs the soul to care for it, the 'connections' between body and soul, are legion. So the body has a lot of built-in affect on the soul. Analogous, to how the weak affect the strong. The Paradox of God's Choosing the Hell of Creation, all wrapped up in our own natures! Now you see why Paul wrote Romans 6~8, especially Chapter 7. So Satan (&Co.) want to get in on the act, and per Trial Terms they have the right of cross-examination. So whatever struggle you have anyway, they 'add' to it. Add feelings, doubts, use the truth to make your awareness of God's Beauty 'hurt' you more, etc. You won't necessarily know they're doing it, and they only ADD TO volition, never coerce volition. So of course, YOU are to blame when you fail, lol. Which, you always do. Every day always big failure.. but the big success of the Doctrine you're using to KOKO you won't 'count' — but Heaven sure does. Matthew 4:4, always occurring! Doctrine fired at the temptation, 1 John 1:9 used against the sin! Even in this world, the biggest test of a recruit for spying is how loyal the wannabe-spy stays to his home nation, when he thinks he's been abandoned by it, or when he's failed in his mission. Much more true, in the spiritual life!
So God plays to Satan, always. The more Truth grows in you, the more you can't stand yourself. The growing True Love for Righteousness (as distinct from false love, which is full of self-praise). The more you love Righteousness the more your body 'shrinks' in importance, so the harder it is to go on living in this world. You get to the point where you can only survive by living on the Bible you have come to love. IT is more real and makes sense: all else, does not. That growing dichotomy makes life much harder, the more you grow. So now multiply that idea a bizillion times, to the Perfect God-Man, Christ. Shoulda killed Him, long before He got to the Cross. Notice it's not a sin issue, but a FINITY issue. Whatever you do with your body and soul, has no value whatsoever in your estimation. And that's true. So you live with it being constantly True. Killer life, truly. It becomes easy to understand why those angels in Revelation 4 throw down their crowns (it's a real mental attitude they're expressing); why Christ would refuse to use His Deity to help Himself; why He turned down all the kingdoms of the world; they're worthless! compared to knowing God. Everything the self is or becomes, isn't worth an ant's fart, compared to knowing Him.
So what Love results, and what would one Want To Give, but oh! Body's not able! See the fight? It's hellish, because your soul doesn't want to be this way anymore, but the body can't learn! The body is too small, even when not sinning. Insult to injury, the body IS sinful, loves anything related to sin good evil, and can overwhelm your soul! Worst of all, you want it! For, no sin or evil gets done, apart from volition! Oh, who will deliver me from this body of death! Paul cries at the end of Romans 7. Hence the continuing need of 1 John 1:9 and keep on truckin', for the repetition beats down the body. Paul likened it to him beating himself up, 1 Corinthians 9:27. Body only understands defeat. So, you have to war against it. Box against it. See? Thus you get RAPPORT of appreciation for the Hell God elected, when He elected to create you. It plays ugly, I am a worm not a man, Psalm 22: but the meaning couldn't be more beautiful, more tender, more..fulfilling. It's not masochism, it's Learning, Hebrews 5:8-9.
So why did God do this to Himself? That's Satan's ultimate litmus test for rebellion. And the Divine Answer? I Manufacture Righteousness. Now that sounds like an impossible thing. How do you manufacture, what's already Infinite? Lookie here at God's 12-step program!
- By CYCLING it, Romans 5:5, 1 Corinthians 2:16, "treasure in earthen vessels" (pouring jugs).
- "The Noble Deposit", His Thinking Truth gets deposited in us;
- Truth is an Attribute of God;
- God's Attributes are indivisible,
- so in depositing Truth via Learning via the Spirit,
- Christ's Own Humanity became functionally Divine. (Now you know why He was Indwelt and Filled by the Spirit, and we Church are, too.)
- So now, His Soul can be 'copied'.
- Christ is the Original Divine Thought Cycler.. in His Humanity, Matthew 4:4 — always 'occurring' to FATHER's Omniscience, timeless!
- We Church are to be made "copies" of Him (hupogrammos, Petrine term).
- For since the Original was made from the Holy Spirit doing it TO His Human Soul, well —
- doesn't matter that we are sinners, the Process is the Same.
- So, a manufacture of Righteousness where it did not exist.. exists!
Isaiah 54:1, wa tsahali, lo hala! Sterile, bearing? Yep.
So the post-salvation life is to build the Cycling Structure, followed by Function (structure always precedes function, no fetus has a soul because it's not independent). When you hit Pleroma, you're Child-Bearing, so can be a King having 'kids', the ruled in your Kingdom. See, to be a King in His Kingdom, your soul has to be big enough to 'cover' all the souls you will forever rule. Just as, His Soul is bigger than the universe He Rules. Then the Function gets tested in the Trial Docket. Takes most of your life to get the Structure built, and there are many prior structures and functions built up along the way, spiritual childhood, adolescence, adulthood (see Part III of the Thinking Series). Once in Pleroma, where the huge Truth in you and your huge Love Motive 'merge' (my pastor's terms), the rest of your life is spent getting the cycling to function COMPLETELY. By then you're a King and know it, sometime not long before death (2 Timothy 4:7-8). But you must die victorious, it is a cliff-type vesting (all-or-nothing "endure to the end" — not a salvation verse, but a Victorious Witness verse, as context in Book of Hebrews shows).
Christ nailed sin away on the Cross, so the only issue we face is How Much Rapport Do We Want? Our fragile, sinful natures help familiarize us with the essential parameters of the Election God Made. We are constantly frustrated in our daily lives. Sure, what we face is way smaller — but still paradigmal. So do we want what to us is 'hell', to Get More Rapport With The God Who Elected Hell For Himself? Or do we like Satan, say "no"? Doesn't matter that we are puny sinners. Does matter, that we face the same paradigmal choice. For God is all about RAPPORT.
See, there's a whole other spiritual life post-salvation, and it's amazing that Satan (&Co.) have kept it under wraps all these centuries, successfully covering it up in favor of their fake-moral, Brother-Foot PEASANT, substitute Churchinanity. So yeah, just believe once in Christ and you are eternally saved, will live with God in heaven — but as what? A spiritual baby, distant from God in your thinking but close to people and works? LOL, who wants that?! People who opt for Churchinanity are some of the most petty people on earth.. because they are babies, spiritually. Whining all the time. Count me outta that!
So the entire Trial boils down to one question: Do you want to Be With God Forever, and How Much? In hell, in Heaven — in a word, Unconditional. Just because, God IS. Who He Is. Jahweh YehHWAH: I am Who I am. Unconditional Existence Requires An Unconditional Election. Which, Satan was not willing to make. Which, the Son WAS willing to make, by Adding Humanity to Himself: Phili2:7.
TWO PARADOXES
As always, if God's 'side' is right, then self-merit cannot be the basis for relationship with finity: for were it the basis, the shortfall between finite and infinite merit is unbridgeable (hence a God-Man to go to the Cross as Humanity and bridge the unbridgeable). If Satan's 'side' is right, then ONLY self-merit can be the basis for relationship, in which case Infinite Merit should forever go unrequited: for both sides agree that God is infinite.
HENCE TWO PARADOXES: 1) If Merit Should Be The Basis For Relationships Among Beings, What Kind Of Relationship Is It, If Based On That Need? That need, is the need of Merit, itself. But wait! Would any love be real, or.. feigned, faked, fantasized to get goodies? In short, if you and I have a relationship, but the Merit is the basis, then is it the merit which is the object of love.. or, the person? So if the merit, where is grace? If no grace, where is love? For surely love should not be restricted to deserved objects. Then love isn't love, but tit-for-tat.. wages, not freedom. See Romans 4. Worse, then our need for God means we aren't really loving HIM, but only His Goodies. How fair is that, to God? Just because Someone is rich, so "he can afford it", should unfairness against Him be okay? God is the Richest Person in the Universe, owning everything. That doesn't justify HIM getting unrequited love, does it? Yet how can we love Him BACK, if we are so needy? Ach, what a tangled paradox this is!
If somehow Paradox 1) got resolved, there remains 2) How MUCH Merit Ought To Be The Basis For Relationships? Right away, you see the problem: we'd all have to be of equal merit, for the minute there's a differential, then the relationship must be restricted due to that differential. You know: the poor guy can't marry the rich girl, because he can't support her. Or, the poor gal can't marry the rich guy, because she's not good enough. Who's richer, than God? So how can we 'marry' (have a permanent intimate relationship with) Him?
Notice how there is no solution to the Waste and Rapport problem, except to live with the tension. Which you only will want to do, if you love God for Himself. As that Love grows further, the tension becomes a source of relief, giving your own soul a way to pour out, just because. Of course, suffering of itself pays nothing. But Love yearns to have a cost which actually 'buys' something. So God being omnipotent, makes something of real value from your desire to reciprocate, from your suffering. Whatever you vote, you get. And when you vote that God get, He does. Sure, He's Omnipotence. But when you can do anything, what you choose to do will be based on Meaning. God withholds from Himself what He wants, in favor of someone else voting for it. That's how Love thinks, and God is Love. So, although He can give Himself whatever He wants, what He wants is to FOREGO, unless and until someone else wants Him to have "x". So, Christ wanted that, too: to pay Father, by foregoing His Own Godness and Perfect Humanity, even through the Cross. Spirit grew Christ, He didn't grow Himself. So we believers get to have that same Voting Experience. On the Cross, the payment for sins was received by Christ, since the Sprit sustained Him. So not only did He receive the real sins and their judgement, but the Spirit kept on running Truth in Christ's Soul, and Christ kept on Voting YES to that; so, that Truth Cycling literally paid for the sins, DDNA-converting them all via His Thinking 'reply' as they hit and lacerated Him, Isaiah 53:7 and :11 (lo hamas asah lo mirmah b'piw in :7, and bedato yasdiq in v.11).
God loves manufacturing Righteousness, but never apart from the creature wanting it, and only to the extent the creature wants it. God loves giving. God loves giving us what we want. So, when we want it to 'cost' us, He enables that. When we want Him to get something from us, to reciprocate, He enables that. In short, He's not after "production" from us. Rather, He only wants to receive what you want to give; if you want to give more than you are capable of giving, He enables that to happen — because, it's what you want. Meanwhile, that Cycling mentioned above in "Rapport" section pleases Him utterly, and we share Rapport with Him in whatever we are doing with that circulation; even, if just brushing our teeth. The cycling itself manufactures Righteous Thinking and Action; genuine pleasure, not the angsty life of the legalistic Christian.
But wait! Like Romans 6 begins, why would Holy God refuse merit as the basis for relationship, grant us His Own Righteousness if we simply believe once, in Christ (Acts 16:31, John3:16, 2 Corinthians 5:21, Titus 3:5, Romans 8:1ff, all "in Him" verses)? What, so we could sin the more? Why then was there a Cross? If merit didn't matter, why not just sin and sin and sin? Why was there a need to Pay for Sin, the mother of all good-and-evil? Oy, what's the real Nature of Merit? What follows is a four-part synopsis of God's Trial Answer.
1. Merit is an EFFECT, never a cause. God didn't cause His Own Eternal Existence or Merit. He doesn't have to work at staying meritorious. Likewise, the Humanity of Christ was caused to become Meritorious by means of Divine Truth Poured Into Him (i.e., John 1:14-16, Matthew 4:4). So salvation is never due to human merit (Ephesians 2:8-9, Titus 3:5, 2 Timothy 1:9). Nor is post-salvation growth meritorious (i.e., John 4:23-24).
Notice the Consummate Humility of God. God is essentially, undeserved. He didn't make Himself God. He is so appreciative of that fact, He Elected Hell for Himself, just to maximally express His Appreciation. Additionally, Three Gods — so, Total Appreciation To Have The Privilege Of Knowing Each Other. So, electing hell three ways — to Pour Out for Each Other. That's where we come in. We are low. To make us As Good As Himself, HE has to go low: tapeinow, Philippians 2:8, usually translated "humbled" (or equivalent), really means "to go low". (Hebrew equivalent is shaphal/shuah and a host of other verbs.) This is the starting point of all God's Thoughts. That's why, grace. Grace is an Expression of Love, my pastor repeatedly reminds his congregation. You bet: and this is why the Love, because God Didn't Make Himself.
See what a boon it is? No angst, no upkeep, no maintenance. Free. He doesn't have to work at it, because He didn't Make Himself Perfect, in the first place. Being always God, there is no origin to Him: in Exodus 3:14, He very pointedly tells Moses this fact, for what Judaism calls "the Ineffable Name" (YHWH), means "Always-Being" (ho own, in Greek, which even sounds like hawah or hayah, from which YHWH likely derives). [See also John 1, because John makes sound-and-word play out of ho own, and a host of other Old Testament specialty words. Fabulous!] So, no need to propitiate some higher power, either. So He Doesn't Want Anyone To Propitiate Him, either. The Cross is first and foremost, a Pouring Out Of Love, Isaiah 53:10-12. That it also Fulfills Justice Issues about unequal merit, comes along for the ride.
If merit is the basis for relationship, then it becomes the 'god' between the parties in the relationship. Since God is Inherent Merit, if He makes Merit the criterion for the Relationship, then Love would never be the basis. So note the Paradox: if Love cannot be the basis, there's no merit in Merit being the basis. For life apart from Love is worthless, 1 Corinthians 13:1-3. So it's got to be a Gift, the Relationship. So any "Propitiation" must be Headed By Love, or else there's no reason to BE Propitiated. Without Love there is no satisfaction, Isaiah 53:11-12.
God is inherent merit. So each Attribute of God is likewise Inherent Merit. Uncaused. One of God's Attributes, is Truth. Truth isn't merely the content of facts; rather, what really makes TRUTH, is that it sets Correct Relationships among not only facts, but potential facts; sets what ought to be facts, as well as what ought not to be (or potentially be) facts. Like math, Truth Defines what the relationships not only are, but ought to be. Else, God's Other Attributes like Righteousness, Justice, Omniscience, etc. — would not be Competent. For, whatever isn't or shouldn't be True, couldn't work.
Truth, again, is inherently meritorious: it is also something which can be Learned. So, being one of God's Attributes, and being learnable, Truth, 'propagates' immaterially: so Uncreated Merit Can Be Given — by pouring Truth into a creature (see Romans 5:5, Greek, and do an across-Bible-reference on all the words there). You read the thoughts on this page. They are now in your head, yet remain ON the page. So, any 'merit' in the words likewise 'reproduced' in your head — yet, remain on the page. So the 'progeny' of merit never cause themselves, either. God didn't cause Himself to be Righteous, but rather just always was; Christ didn't cause Himself to be Righteous in His Humanity, but the God-breathed Truth INTO Him did that; which Truth, itself was never caused, but always WAS. All He ever did, was to Keep Believing. And even that, was motivated due to what He progressively knew via all those Diamond Doctrine deposits the Holy Spirit kept on feeding Him (Matthew 4:4, Philippians 2:13, 2 Corinthians 5).
So that Truth was codified for us to get it, too. Old Testament, His Thinking as God; New Testament, His Thinking as Man. To be poured into us, to transform us [1 Corinthians 2, 6, 12, 13(from 12:31's Head wordplay!), 2 Corinthians 3, 5; Romans 5:5, Romans 6~8, Romans 12:2-3, Ephesians 4:11-16, 23, 2 Peter 3:18, Hebrews 4:9-13, 11:1-6, and many other passages]. So we can't ever cause Merit, because by nature it is an Effect from an Uncaused Existence, God's. There Is No Other Source. Note how this process makes us truly meritorious, but sans angst: for He Pours Merit Into Us, so it's real, alright: but only God can RUN it all, so we have no cause for angst, since we don't make ourselves meritorious. Whew! No wonder Paul wanted "the fellowship of His Sufferings" (Philippians 3:10), to maximally express his pent-up gratitude!
2. Because Merit is Uncaused, God doesn't 'seek' merit from man. Rather, He 'seeks' RAPPORT. Shared Thinking (Isaiah 55:8, see context). Even the dumbest human knows that all the goodies don't make companionship enjoyable between incompatible people. Many's the story of the wealthy couple who hate each other, kill each other, divorce. Compatibility makes for happiness, not goodies. Couples in great distress; families in great splendor; every grouping in between, for millennia through song and story all recount how Love, not goodies, makes man happy. But Love requires Compatibility. Compatibility requires Shared Attitudes. In a word, Rapport. So God's Truth Creates Rapport. As we learn Him, we come to think like Him. Hence, have more Rapport with very God. His Very Son's Thinking. Hence the many more commands to know something, compared to the paltry few, to 'do' something, in Bible. Your biggest hint: if 'spirituality' was doing something, we'd not need 66 books of so much non-work material in them. A dream, a vision, even a 30-page list, would suffice!
If you peruse the Bible greats in the Bible and ask yourself, What did they do to become great? you will be in for a very big surprise. Abram was accounted great because he BELIEVED God (Genesis 15:6, Romans 4, James 2:22-26, always mistranslated, but his belief is stated); as a result, he was willing to kill his own son (prototype of Father-and-Son-on-Cross). That doesn't sound good, does it? What real work is that? Faith, What Is Believed, that's what the 'work' is (James' point, but translation is screwy, so you miss it). What did Moses do? Same thing: Believe, And As A Result, he went to Pharaoh, stayed with Israel despite their always wanting to kill him, etc. Well, what work is that? Do you see any money changing hands? There's nothing here about giving to the poor, witnessing to people, and the scads of activities touted as what we should do. These Are Greats, and none of these things are noted as the reason why they are great. Look at any of the others: David, Hezekiah, Isaiah, you-name-'em. What Did God Praise? Their Faith. See Heb11!
So it's not works, baby, but What They Knew; Who They Knew; Believing In What They Knew. Believing In Who They Knew. That's it. And Christ? What did He really do? What good deeds are recorded? I can't find even one: you can't count the miracles, because He Is God, so it took no effort to make bread or heal the sick. Even He deprecated/ didn't take credit for His Own Miracles, even though they prove He's Messiah: John 6:2,26-29 (sets the theme), 10:25,37-38, 14:10-13; Matt7:22, 11:20-23, 13:54-58, many more passages. And why? Because the miracles are a witness as to His Identity, and so people should have believed them. Not, because they were good deeds, but because they were demonstrations of Divine Power. See the difference? Believing was the goal, not to promote good deeds! But, as He noted sadly in all those (and kindred) passages, an evil generation seeks a sign — to get goodies, not to believe. Same kind of problem Satan has, in Matthew 4. Notice how Doing Good Does Not Promote Belief. Even if God's the Doer! no good deed goes unpunished, by hatred.
Funny thing about good deeds: everyone seeks them, everyone promotes them, but if you actually succeed, you are reviled. Hated. Envied. So, knocked down. That's why good deeds don't promote belief, but instead man's negativity. That's why an evil generation seeks a sign (semeion, always has a negative 'judgment' connotation in Bible). To get something. Kinda like the guy who picks up a gal and then 'after', just throws her away. Users. Look how everyone USES Christ today. His Name is rah-rah'd, bandied about as an epithet, derided, debunked, denuded. By believers and unbelievers alike, everyone fixated on proving Him. No more famous Person in history, exists. More people are fixated on Him than any other person born. So His Good Deed at the Cross — which really was no good deed at all, but Voting — garnered Him what? No Privacy. Hatred. Misguided Loyalty. See: no good deed goes unpunished. He's still being nailed today, even as He was 2000 years ago!
Yet That One did the Greatest Work of All Time — which was, To rest on the Cross like a Lamb. Do lambs give to charity? Do lambs give potlucks, plow 30 hectares, hold fund-raisers, build hospitals? No, Lambs Die. Isaiah 53:7, like a Lamb (Seh) that is led to slaughter.. as a EWE (Rachel) before its shearers is dumb, so He opened not His Mouth... Whoa. no works, there. The Work Was Done To Him, see? Lambs don't kill themselves, Someone Else kills them. The Word does the work, not the one who has the Word IN him. Hint hint.
Obviously being immoral is not good, theme of Romans 6. But we are the most immoral if we claim our good deeds should count before God, theme of Romans 2 and 4. Any believer who doesn't learn and live on Word says God is not important to know: so is like a frigid wife who prefers her makeup and hair, lunches with the girls, diamonds and clothes — to her husband. She spends her time on many good deeds, charities, etc. — but not, on him. That's the worst kind of infidelity, never mind she'd never sneak into a hotel room with some guy. Most Christians are frigid wives. Prove it: ask them to describe God Himself, see how all you get in response are childish, shallow parrotings and platitudes.
For no amount of merit, works, goodies can substitute for a lack of rapport, nor can they buy rapport. It's there, or it is not: alikeness in thinking is there, or is not. So no amount of works, goodies, merit matter if there IS Rapport. So, One wants to be a Lamb, due TO Rapport. How ironic: note that in a relationship, rapport is everything. No matter how meritorious the parties IN the relationship may be, equally or no, if they don't have Shared Thinking, the relationship is a misery. Fingernails scrawling on a blackboard. No amount of money, talent, looks can make rapport: in fact, those things turn ugly, if the rapport is not present; their lack Becomes Beautiful if rapport IS present.
But as we saw in the "Rapport" Trial Issue above, God's 12-Step program for Pouring Truth into a person, DOES make Rapport. Each pouring in is not forced, but the human volition, wants it. Hence, an Increase in Sharing God's Thinking, is unmerited favor, because God wants it, too. Which ends up making the person meritorious, more than all wealth could ever fantasize doing! Even though, merit is not the issue: 2 Corinthians 5:21, anyone gets God's Own Righteousness the nanosecond he first believes in Christ. That's how you could even get the Truth poured INTO you, in the First place. (Christ was born Perfect, since not 'fathered' in Adam.) See God's Superior Power, Ephesians 1:19 Plan? Hah! Cry all the way to the Doctrine Bank, you blessed Christian... [God's objective for all souled creation is to Grow In Rapport with God the Son. One-third of the angels, didn't do that; the first Adam didn't do that; the Last Adam, did. Even though, by that time, the Level Needed For Total Rapport to exist, had increased due to sin (see last half of Romans 5), such that there had to be a Cross.]
Isaiah 53:10-12 is the contract for the 12-step program, see the now-deprecated Isa53.htm and ArchiDes.htm for details on those five infinitives. The DDNA webseries was born from them. Using other terminology, my pastor has taught this essential God-remakes-you theme for over 50 years. Other pastors have too. It's not like God didn't get the Word out, on what the spiritual life, really is. But people prefer ritual, works, and human approbation instead of God [1 John 1:6,8,10 strawman (continues throughout the letter), 1 John 3:18's sarcasm]. It's really that simple and tragic.
See how crazy we are? For Free, we get the Merit so to get the Rapport. Because, merit is of no value, absent Rapport. So, like Isaiah says in Isaiah 55 (depicting Doctrine as food and drink, a common metaphor throughout Bible) — come, 'buy', eat! Without money (merit, cost, something you do), without price (no strings/ gimmicks/ religious folderol)! Because, His Thoughts are Priceless! Because, our ways are not His Ways, nor our thoughts His Thoughts.. so Get His Thoughts! Which paid for sins, Isaiah 53:11's Hebrew. Is there greater relief than to be made meritorious for Free? So aren't we crazy like Satan, to reject that? No wonder the getting of His Thinking, the Word in Writing, was the biggest of all the Old Testament promises, one which the Psalm 119 people kept on claiming every day they were tortured and raped on their deathmarch to Babylon. It kept them, sane! [Besides Isaiah 55, many Bible verses remind us of this promise. The best known of them was Jeremiah 31:31-34, quoted and explained in Hebrews 8:8-12 through Hebrews 10:15-17 (the two passages act like bookends). Paul's epistles always depict this getting His Thinking in Writing in crescendo: Ephesians is wholly dedicated to it. 1 Corinthians 2-13 is extremely deft, tying to John 17's oneness in a rolling series of back-and-forth analogies between His Thinking and our being IN Him, our being a Body, with Him as the Head. Fancy that: the only virgin apostle gets to focus the most on this shared thinking marital theme!]
Here is the ultimate proof that God wants Rapport, not merit: God can speak, and thus create, total obedience in you instaneously and forever, any nanosecond He likes. It's the Same Power, as creating the universe. But notice He doesn't do that. What does He do instead? Ephesians 3:15-19, 2 Peter 3:18! So your obedience, is not what He really wants. You can't obey Him, He must BUILD you, Philippians 2:12-13, Ephesians 2:10. Like a father, He talks to His Children in terms of obediences, for children don't understand enough to see that the 'obediences', are for their benefit. But the adults know. So, be adult in your conclusions: if God really wanted merit from you, He could bing you with it immediately. And in fact, if you are a believer in Christ, He already did that: 2 Corinthians 5:21. So merit is not an issue: Rapport, that's the issue. No other issue, remains! Not pets, but people! Free will, not mindlessness. Free Rapport, not kowtowing, sniveling, sycophancy. It's Satan, not God, who wants the pet tricks.
Satan needs you to buy the opposite of his own Trial Contention, in order to win in the Trial. Satan contends that no creature can possibly be righteous, so God should have set a lower standard based on what the creature CAN do, because there's too much angst in trying to meet God's Standard. But to the human race, he sells the idea that YOU MUST DO FOR GOD, and tyrannically, too — knowing full well this will tie you up in knots, as there's no standard of any variety, which anyone on earth could ever meet. Pretend, for example, that the sole standard of Righteousness was to light a candle at sundown on Friday, after which You Are Not Allowed To Work (real Jewish law, here). Now: what's "sundown"? What if it's a cloudy day and you can't SEE the sun to know if it went down? Jews resolved this by saying that if you can't see the difference between blue and white thread, then it's time to light the candle. Ok: WHAT SHADE of blue? Light blue, medium blue, Prussian blue, dark blue? And if it's a cloudy day, you might not be able to see the difference in color, at 8am! What if you have no thread? What if the thread is dirty? What if you are color blind?
Let's continue: what size candle? What if it breaks as you light it, so now the sun is down and you aren't allowed to go buy another, because that's considered a "work". What if you burn your finger while lighting it, so now you need a doctor? Well, you can't call one because that's a work, and the doctor would be working, too! Do you see the problem here? These questions are of the same type as in the Mishnah, on a dizzying array of petty topics. Since the Mishnah was 1st-century Judaism, now you know why the Lord excoriated the Pharisees so much. Unbelievable tangling up of what is supposed to be a Rest Day, so instead you Arrest and are very Unrested! Every religion on the planet has rules like this, and there is no way even the least of them doesn't get violated! Our Federal Law in the United States is exactly like this, pil-pul micromanaging. It's sickening, totally satanic to the core, this kind of thinking! But sold as holy, boy oh boy!
And what happens if you keep on being 'faithful' to such rules? You deaden. You eventually come to equate "God" with PAIN. That's exactly what Satan wants. Alternatively, he sells Emotional God, a rah-rah chanting or singing or gathering to buck-each-other-up, because after all, the many rules have exhausted you! Then there's Tyrannical God, the one who your family keeps telling you you're disobeying. So they can control you the better. Substitute for "family" the imam, rabbi, pastor, priest or other 'holy' person who directly or indirectly is the 'authority'. It's disgusting. So you need the Emotional God, to feel good again, and have the buck-up to go through another week of tyranny. Satan's not stupid. We sure are.
Any Christian who thinks he can lose his salvation or is not saved until he's lived a good-enough life (all versions of Catholicism, Western or Eastern, and many branches of Protestantism) is too dumb to read Bible, and may not even be saved. BELIEVE ONCE in Christ, and you are forever saved, John 3:16. Plain even in translation. Those who think they must add baptism, deeds, get last rites or are unsaved if after believing they commit some particular sin, might never have 'done' John 3:16. You can't help them. They are drunk with Satan's lies, 2 Timothy 2:26-3:7. God will do what's needed.
God is not like Satan: God GIVES you His Own Righteousness that first nanosecond you're saved, so you can sigh with Relief about being "good enough", 2 Corinthians 5:21, Epheisans 1:15-23, especially v.19. For it's a Sharing to build up Rapport, main theme of Romans 8 (beginning at verse 4). It's all about Togetherness, John 17. Thus you know from 2 Corinthians 5:21 that there are NO BARRIERS. Technically, the removal was Paid For on the Cross. That's why your consent is required, for you might not agree to the removal of the barriers. When you first believed in Christ, that was a consent to live with God forever. Dozens of things happened to you within a nanosecond afterwards, because all of those things were necessary in order to remove the Barrier to living with God forever: such as, you got His Righteousness; His Eternal Life; your sin nature is removed at your death; you have what my pastor likes to call a "portfolio of invisible assets" so you can Learn Christ, since after all, you'll be living with Him forever. And so on. Royal Assets, as extensively explained, in LordvSatan3.htm.
Much of the Christian spiritual life is spent learning what he is and has, in Christ. He learns details about what instantly happened to him the nanosecond he first believed; he learns how to live the spiritual life as a result of those changes; he learns to accept or reject getting Closer In Likemindedness, as he studies under his right pastor. So, the barriers to likemindedness — the good-and-evil mindset we all genetically inherited in Adam — reduce. It's a low, slow, constant lifestyle of progressive Cycling Of Word Learned in your head, so its most powerful removals go undetected. Until, much later on, something happens and you realize, oh! I got 'bigger'! For, to live with God forever closely, you gotta get Bigger Inside, than you are now.
For most of the Christian life, one imagines things are barriers, based on human (and satanic) standards. But it's all a lie! An illusion of barriers, but no real ones! Christ's work on the Cross Is A Work The Holy Spirit Did In Him. So, complete, tetelestai (a word He uttered on the Cross). As a result, "all things" (ta panta, Bible keyword) have a different purpose, Now: the old meaning of them (the ones you see or think you see) are Invalidated. Instead, they are made Training Aids for your new life. Completely. Creation's wrongs can never compare with Divine Rights. So God assumes Rights over all, and pays for it all, Isa45:7. Paul learned this and lived on forgetting the past, Phili3:13-14. Paul, like David, had a lot of past to forget. Paul is the worst sinner in human history, per his own biography to Timothy, 1 Timothy 1:16 (in context; see also 1 Corinthians 15:1-10). Now since 1 Timothy is the Word of God, Paul's testimony is true. So um — you and I are not the worst sinners in history. So um, God made us good enough!
The big discovery of the Trial and the spiritual life, is that there are really no barriers to your Intimacy with God. The satanic game is to pretend that what you reject or find problemmatic, harm the relationship. Nothing can do that, but it takes time for the believer to recognize that fact. It's like coming out of a haze, when you finally wake up to the fact that there are No Barriers, and every problem you face is in fact a Celebration that there are No Barriers. Nothing can separate you from the Love of God in Christ Jesus, as Paul shouts toward the end of Romans 8.
When you experience something which bothers you in self, others, or things, the real meaning of that thing is that It Is NO HINDRANCE, and the God is Using It To ENHANCE The Relationship with Him. Period. Kinda like when Joseph quipped to his brothers about what evil they did to him, You meant it for bad, but God Meant It For Good. Romans 8:28! It's no lie, and it's not too good to be true, but instead is Isaiah 54:1 playing out before your very eyes. That you can't yet see how true it is, that's normal. But God Sees It. Therefore you know for a fact that it's true: for God To Justify Seeing It, It Has To Be Flipped Such That There Are No Barriers; Since, God Is Infinite; Whatever He Sees, He Always Sees (even long after it's over). Infinity means No Barriers. So, there really are none. Only the illusions, in our eyes. But His Eyes are True; so we can celebrate that He sees No Barriers!
Peter picked up on this, when he talked about "partakers of the Divine Nature" — a play on the Greek idea of how man becomes 'one' with the gods, in 2 Peter 1 (v.4, koinonios, from which we get the English, "communion"). Remember, Bible always talks in terms of what its audience, can relate to. So, 2 Peter 1 starts out as an analogy between Getting His Truth In You, and the extreme expense of putting on a Greek play (epichoregew, v.5 — can't be translated in English, so you miss the analogy in translation).
Notice how communion — aka Rapport — is obtained: by means of TRUTH being deposited in you. Not by rituals, not by works, not by human anything. God does it TO you, every time you vote yes to learn or know Bible. Sure, you need 1 John 1:9, or you're voting for Satan, in God's Name (the norm). Sure, you need to be under whomever is your own God-appointed right pastor, or again, you're voting for Satan (the norm). GodSystem.htm shows the four basics every believer must be doing, to avoid voting for Satan's plan. Not a single work or ritual is required. Of course, maybe for you personally, some given deed or ritual will teach you something about Him, make Bible come alive more, who knows — that's between you and God. For as we saw in the MISTRIAL section of "Trial Issues", just as Christ Invented the Spiritual Life and Legated it to us (1 Peter 2:21), so also, each of us invents how to use the Bible we are learning, down here. Because, we are Royal Priests in Training to become Kings, 1 Peter 2:5,9, Revelation 1:6, 5:10, 1 Corinthians 4:8 (sarcastic). In short, if being a Catholic makes you learn Bible better, and you learn to merely adjust out the falsehoods in it to what Bible says instead (not hard to do), then.. before God, it's maybe the right 'sect' to be in, for YOU. (Substitute "Catholic" for any other sect you want to name. Every 'sect' gets major Bible passages quite wrong. Only God can be right.)
Greek plays were always about communion with the gods. It was the ultimate in human endeavor: read Plato's Philebus. What was considered "good" in Greek culture, called "agathos", was Divine Good. Nothing less was really considered, good. Aiming in that direction was good, but the real benefit, was to get to be with the gods, hence AGATHOS was their good, not one's own. So Peter uses that concept to explain the Absolute Good that God creates IN you: the pouring in of truth. Hence his lofty (Greek) language, in 2 Peter 1, where he even makes a deliberate mistake, creating a word "megistos" (a superlative, "greatest", which koine Greek lacks), to stress Value. Value of Communion. Value of getting This Most Precious Truth. Value so high, it's even greater than the millions of dollars required to equip a Greek play. And of course, we are IN a Play.. a Trial. In classic Greek epic style, the gods playing out their conflict via mankind. Heh.
In his later spiritual development stages, the believer emulates Christ because he has come to realize, despite all the world's masking, that there really are no barriers to closeness: last verses in Romans 8. Your shortcomings, and the shortcomings you see in people and things, are not barriers, because you are a new-in-species creation In Christ: 2 Corinthians 5:17. Those aren't just words. And if a new creation, all the old things you see, are not potent: main threaded theme of Romans 5~8.
The religious sales pitch is a powerful one, designed to barrier our perception that God wants Rapport, not merit. For by the time you die, Whatever You Elected Be The Relationship With Him.. will BE. So any barriers between Him and you, are solely those of your own choosing. People like religious barriers, to feed ego. There is no other reason. It feels good to do something which complies with 'god', just like it felt good to eat from the Tree of Knowledge of Good-and-Evil, in the name of being as smart as God. Self did it, see. Inferiority complex, assuaged. Trouble is, this ego boost CREATES barriers to intimacy. For, the more you boost your ego, the more you have to do it the next time. Repeating over and over these boosts you construct a Progressively Greater Barrier To Intimacy, since intimacy never 'competes'. If you're competing, you're not sharing, and intimacy is all about sharing. Egos which need boosting need defending, see.
So, the religious pitch seeks to REVERSE God's message (hallmark of satanic involvement is substitution/ reversal). It goes something like this: Well, see, God wants you to choose to obey. That's as satanic an argument, as it gets. Think sanely: if obedience was really the issue, then God can cause a superior obedience: so if obedience was an issue, then God Cheats Himself if He doesn't bing you — since you can't do 'whatever' well enough, for His level of Achievement. So your wanting to obey, must have another purpose. For you cannot possibly even obey as much as you'd want, Romans 7.
Both Cervantes' Don Quixote and the movie "The Matrix" well depict the illusion we humans cherish, compared to the reality Bible explains. In Romans 7, Paul casts himself in a poignant role to show how impossible it is for the flesh to obey God (leadup to Rom8). No matter how positive you are, your positive volition is vulnerable to religious gambits, to try to express itself. So also, the negative volition. Flesh 'kidnaps' both, so volition is constantly in this tug-of-war. Part of our so-great salvation is that this war ends. It ends sooner (though it takes most of the lifespan), if you get into learning His Thinking. Else, you just end screaming! like Paul depicts in Romans 7's end. So you have a choice: a purposeFULL war ending in Pleroma if you stick it out; or, like Satan, a purposeLESS war, constantly tilting after imagined 'giants' who are but windmills, blowing your life away; riding a skinny horse you imagine a steed, pining away for a hag, imagining yourself a savior. If you ever once believed in Christ, you go to heaven after the end. If you never once believed in Christ, you go on screaming forever.. Creating barriers out of thin air, so to block relationship with God.
In short, any barriers are of one's own making. Since such barriers block rapport, the individual is refusing rapport to that extent. All the good deeds won't substitute for it, and in fact create the illusory justification for barriers, i.e., at the GWTJ in Revelation 20:11-15. There, people clamor for their good deeds to count, so they can maintain the barrier that they are worthy. They, not God.. just like Satan himself argues, in Matthew 4!
How odd: verses like 2 Corinthians 5:21, Acts 16:31, John 3:16, Ephesians 2:8-9 are famous in Christendom, yet we all go on, manufacturing our many religious barriers to learning Him. Huffing and puffing, cutting up all that wood, hay and stubble — only to find out, we were already granted Divine Righteousness the first nanosecond we were saved! Thereafter, it was just a question of Learning How To Live It. Capacity for that wealth. Pity, then, that when most of us die we never learned our Manual on how to live it. So, the Wealth of it, cannot be handled. So the talents go to those who made the most in this life: remember the parable of the talents? A 'talent' was worth a lot of money — but then, as now, if you don't know how to use it, you trample it underfoot. So the "true riches" of Scripture yield very material riches for all eternity, because the true riches teach you how to use the lesser forms. For the greatest wealth of all, is knowing Him. So, don't know Him, have no capacity for anything else. In heaven, yes; as-good-as-God, yes. As CAPACIOUS as God, no. So, you'll be exactly happy with what you get for it will suit your self-chosen 'size' of soul. And the more barriers you construct to boost ego, the more limited your 'size', forever. Love never coerces.
So there is a different meaning to any Biblical exhortation to 'obey': OBEY=BELIEVE, not vice versa, main theme of Hebrews Chapters 3 and 4. Evil is unbelief, Hebrews 3:8,12,18-19. It's not works, it's BELIEVING. Obviously, if you believe in a thing, your behavior will reflect that. But there's a Deeper Meaning, which as a spiritual adult, you'll cherish: To Learn To Think As He Does. Hebrews 5:8 is one of my favorite verses, and is all about how 'obedience' depends on hearing, and thus Learning: the verse is funny, in Greek, as my pastor likes to remind us. "Although THE SON, He LEARNED (emathen) from the SOURCE OF what He SUFFERED (epathen), obedience."
- Trick is, "obedience" is hupakoe, which is a HEARING: shema, Israel, Deuteronomy 6:4. James echoes this in his "doer of the Word" clause in James 1; Moses said same thing in Deuteronomy 30, and Paul picks it up in Romans 10.
- The compound noun (hupo+akouo) literally means to-stand-under-what-you-heard. You HEAR something, and you believe it, is the meaning.
- God instructs you, 1 Corinthians 2:15-16; and instead of you going off after looking in the mirror (James 1), you Believe His Instruction. His Head, not yours, so 1 Corinthians 2:16 is BUILT in you (Ephesians 3:15-21).
- So, you learn. It's a Gift, get it?
- That's why the verse is funny, because it's Hebraistic. Say this with a Yiddish/Jewish accent: is it suffering, if it's learning? Gift, Gimel, Gelt, spin on the dreidel. Feast on His Lights, and you get all the chocolate money!
- Come to think of it, Bible Doctrine really does taste like heavenly chocolate. Well, He did say, "All fat is the Lord's!" and "Delight yourself in fatness!"
Christ made a big point of God's Rapport Goal, whenever He was teaching. For example, He analogized how if even evil fathers want to give good gifts to their children, how much more, God? And that, to Teach Faith. Not obedience (Matthew 7:11; Luke 11:13 is another occasion, same lesson in different context). Small wonder, that "obedience" is used as a metaphor for faith frequently in Scripture (i.e., Romans 1:5, 6:16,; 16:9,26, 2 Corinthians 9:13, 10:5, 1 Peter 1:22, etc). Because, Faith means you share belief: what you do with the belief, will have a varied competence, but no amount of competence matters, if DISbelief. If a spouse stops believing in her mate, won't their relationship thereafter be nothing but drakonfutter (German: guilt offerings)? God clearly believes in Himself. Faith means you do also. Hence a Sharing. Not a chore: it's the Believing, which makes Relationship Satisfying. So, no dragons, slain or otherwise; no guilt offerings. But rather, Fulfillment. Again, Sharing. And relief, for who doesn't remember his happiness when faith was vindicated? God Always Vindicates His Word, Isaiah 55:11, 46:10, many other verses.
And His Word is Power, as many New Testament verses attest. For, Truth Is Power. His Power. So "faith" always means Word Believed, whether in the Hebrew verb aman, or the Greek pisteuw. So their cognate nouns are first about Word, and that is the object of belief. If you don't do this, you will end up miserable, because if Truth is not believed (therefore the need to study, to know what to believe), then only lies are left. Feeling is just a body thing, has no validity of itself. So: it takes a maybe a lifetime's practice, to avoid feeling's influence on your judgement, but every repetition beats down the influence: so each attempt is a victory of its own. Knowing Scripture Well is vital. Just as it was for Christ, in Matthew 4.
But man anthropocentrically interprets everything as a 'do'. So when he sees "obedience", he thinks it's doing something. Like in school: remember how the smart kids were made fun of? Why, school was just a place you had to go because your parents forced you, and all that was good about it, was when it was over! Or, Like reading a manual. The Manual, here. Man skips over anything which doesn't relate to the do, so he can get his good grade, and move on.
See the hatred of learning, there? All the manual, the schooling is worth, is to make you look good via grades and completion. The learning itself, pah! Yeah, make fun of those weirdoes who actually like learning! See? Satan gets us while we're young, and our natures are so totally in rapport with his 'Good-and-Plenty', good-and-evil game. No wonder human relationships are so shallow. [America used to sell a pink-and-white candy-coated licorice in a box, which was named "Good'N'Plenty". The name is an American idiom: means "Very Good And Plenty Of It." The TV commercial sold the candy's name via a railroad train song. Its refrain, went like this (with a whooosh whoosh of train whistle and wheels in the background): "Charlie says, Love My Good and Plenty! Charlie says, Really Rings the Bell! Charlie says, Love My Good and Plenty! Don't know any other candy that I love.. so.. well!" How appropriate, to illustrate the good-and-evil, satanic plan, railroading us all!]
On a deeper level, what really constitutes obedience and hence spirituality, is the dead opposite of how we need to live our lives with each other. What glorifies God in the Trial is that you Want Him, you Learn His Son, and you Wait on Him. If you have any common sense, you immediately know that wanting, learning and waiting on Him is a total thrill to 'do'; like being on vacation, for crying out loud. Yep, that's it. Spiritual sabbatical, 24/7. It's all about what He Does TO You, not what you do at all. Paradoxically, the hardest thing to do.. is nothing. Abram did nothing. And the one thing he did, at his wife's behest, has plagued the Middle East ever since.. get Hagar pregnant. So Abram had to cool his heels for another 14 years, before God would give him Isaac. Same for Isaac, he didn't have kids until he was 60: 20 years of doing nothing. Israel had to do nothing for 400 years, waiting for God to deliver them. Christ did nothing the entire time He was down here, dying on the Cross being carried by the Holy Spirit. Notice a pattern, here? Man is about self-merit, and that means he must do, do, do. Yeah, it's doo-doo. God is about Pouring In His Merit For Free, so it's about no doo-doo. All else but what HE does, is doo-doo. So doing nothing is the hardest thing to do, Matthew 4 taunt eating at you all the time. Use Your Abilities. Solve it Yourself. Don't ask God to do it; don't ask Him for help, understanding, guidance or even HIS Opinion; rather, you DO for Him. Satanic garbage, par excellence.
GOD IS CREATOR. THAT MEANS HE LOVES DOING THE DOING. Your next breath only occurs because HE wants it to. Ok: so if your very breath depends on Him anyway — why not depend on Him in your thinking, instead of depending on yourself, your job, your spouse or kids or politicians? Sure, you want to reciprocate Him, do something worthwhile with your life. But you know you can't get it right. So look: if He loves Doing the Doing and carrying you anyway, 1Pet5:7 — Greek treats God like a pack animal — why not just relax and rely and ask Him what He wants to do with you? Then HE gets what HE wants, to be doing the doing in your life. World really needs that: we're not voting for His Involvement, but instead we're hustling our buns off, and 1 John 1:9 isn't used, so our prayers go no higher than the ceiling! Instead, how about 1 John 1:9 and an Ultimate Jabez: we all need to be like Jabez, asking God for everything, 1 Chronicles 4:10. ["Jabez" in Hebrew sounds like "God's satchel", pronounced "Yah Bets" — you know, where the money really is. LXX shows he's asking for God's Knowledge to prevent him from being abased. I'm not sure which Hebrew verb the LXX is using to render that "knowledge" translation, but usually a prayer that God "be with" is an idiom voting for an intimate relationship.]
Break Time! Watch how God is glorified in the following story my pastor likes to tell. Apparently, when Dallas Theological Seminary first got started, it had financial trouble. Its buildings were mortgaged; and due to the financial problems, couldn't pay the mortgage. Just before the bank was going to foreclose, the heads got together and prayed. One of them was Dr. Ironside. He prayed to the God who has the "cattle on a thousand hills", affirming God could deliver them, even though they were minutes away from the foreclosure phone call. At that very moment, the phone rings. It's the downstairs secretary who says that a cattleman walked in with a huge check claiming God wanted DTS to get it. The amount of the check was exactly what was needed ($180,000 I believe). Do you see how God matched "cattle" to "cattleman"? He LOVES humor, and He LOVES waiting until the last minute! Filling all in all, end Eph1!
Look: I've seen God repeatedly do the very same thing in my own life for over 34 adulthood years. Sometimes the checks arrive at the last minute in Open Envelopes: the person forgot to lick the envelope closed, yet the check didn't fall out? When someone can't pay me, suddenly the Exact Same Amount appears from another source, within days. So I can't miss the orchestration. All this, long before I heard the DTS story — so that when I did hear it, I could match up the same events in my own life, and know more surely, Who did them (even though I knew at the time). YOU have the same events in your life. Look for them. His Humor is Unending!
So let's amalgamate the real meaning of obedience with our stuck-in-merit mindset, see if we can at least understand that way. Ok: we all know we are supposed to obey God. So He Wrote A Book Of Obedience. So, then, the challenge of Hebrews 5:8: do we treat Bible like a computer manual, reading only 10% of it (the portions about do's)? What About The Other 90%? The 'obedience' God wants, is that we hear (shemah, Yisroel) and stand under what we hear: believe it ALL, not just the parts which please our egos. In which case, it's a suffering, lol to hear the other 90%. So we learn to stand under, by suffering the hearing! What a pun! See, if you learn something, that's a satisfaction (propitiation). If you learn something, it's nice to use, live on what you learned. The suffering involved is separate from the satisfaction, and if you really Love The Meaning, even the suffering aids the satisfaction. Not at all masochism. All depends on Who You Hear. So you gotta pick between God's Chocolate, and Satan's licorice doo-doo!
3. Since God wants Rapport, not merit, Whatever Relationship You Want With God, That's What You'll Get — Forever. LordvSatan3.htm focuses the most on this topic. Its Corollaries 3A-3D links cover the issue of you getting whatever you want from God. For God is all about, MATCHING, MATING. So, that policy was illustrated by the Lord in Matt7:1-2. As you judge, you will be judged. So if you judge God not worth learning, then you won't learn Him and you won't be close to Him. The God-Who-Can't-Be-Bribed, won't bribe you, either. Because, God is Love, and Love Never Coerces. So you can be saved forever, but how close you will be to Him, depends on How Alike you became, down here. It's a compatibility question. Being near someone with whom you are not compatible is not fair to either party.
Most believers want relationship with God to be wholly circumscribed by laterals (viz, all the to-people emphasis in pulpits). So, that's what they will get in eternity, too: many intermediaries between them and God. They will be ruled, not rulers. The masses. Thinking like masses. Then quite happy, totally fulfilled, but the way the relationship to God 'flows' will remain largely through laterals (people and things). Which is after all, what they voted for down here.
The Pleroma Rulers, by contrast, aren't better (it's not about merit) of themselves. Made better, yes, but more relevant is MORE DIRECT. Down here, they were not content to have relationship with God circumscribed by laterals: they wanted a Vertical Relationship, as independent from people, 'goodies' or 'baddies', as possible. Ultimate Vertical Person, is Christ. Paul is a good example of a Vertical person made by the Holy Spirit. He is by no means the only one. Any believer can be made up "to the level of maturity that is the fullness of Christ" — a most astonishing statement, Ephesians 4:13, Ephesians 3:15-19, repeated in many ways throughout the New Testament.
If you "finish the course", you do get the crown (2 Timothy 4:7, James 1:12, other "crown" and "inherit..kingdom" verses). Because, the higher you are, the closer you are, and Closeness is what you had kept on voting for, down here. Truth Is Merit, but Voting For Rapport, requires Deposit of Meritorious Truth. Which Builds On that Imputed Divine Righteousness you first got at salvation (2 Corinthians 5:14-21, theme of Romans 8). So, you get closer. Without any merit of your own. Instead, with the Superior Merit: "Christ in you, the Confident Expectation of Glory" (Colossians 1:25-27; also Ephesians 3:20, end Ephesians 1, many other tie-in passages).
First Commandment is a commandment to Rapport! (see Deuteronomy 6, Exodus 20.) As the Lord noted, you cannot serve both God and mammon. "Mammon" means worldly things, earthly things, earthly preoccupations, not merely money (money being representative of the larger preoccupation, the 'commerce' of our usual thoughts). Romans 8 explains the problem (set up by Romans 6-7): it's of the Spirit, or of the flesh. Fundamental incompatibility, between the two. Hence, in order to get close to God, you gotta choose between Him and mammon. God, or good-and-evil: same choice as Adam faced in the Garden.
You Get Whatever Relationship With God You Want, So Consider Carefully What You Want. The more vertical you want it, the more God gives it to you. Which ends up making you more vertical, In Order To Live Vertically Toward Him. So the more vertical you became down here, the higher up the chain of command you will be forever. Because It's An Election To Know Him, not merit, not approval by others, not laterals. God will make you as 'close' to Him as you want to be. It's not a status thing. The 'path' for getting there, is Learn His Son (2 Peter 3:18, Ephesians 3:15-19, Ephesians 4:11-16). You will, toward the end of this 'path', have a very hard time of it, for the competition against the vertical, is extreme — and tailored to what you always wanted and never wanted from the laterals, often at the same time.
So, by the time we all leave this body, we'll have made an aggregate number of choices pro- or con. Believing in Christ is what gets you into heaven, but after that, it's still a matter of choosing, every second, who will be your 'master' to craft the kind of rapport you want with God. As you can see, the choices are antithetical, so the rulers are not really compatible with the ruled. Well, the compatibility is limited, hierarchical, each one up and down the 'line' being closest to those he's most compatible with. So there is a perfect synergy of compatibility, because the connecting points have the most rapport with each other. But, from high to low direct, there is not much compatibility: so, not much contact, either.
Think how uncomfortable it would be for a person who's enamored of flowers, to be stuck in close quarters with a person who can't stand flowers, and loves instead, koine Greek syntax. No compatibility of interest. So, the hierarchical nature of eternal society will avoid the incompatibilities, and fit the compatibilities. So the kings will be distant — which is just what suits the tastes of the masses. They don't really want anything but the status, the glamor image, etc. Intimacy was not desired down here, so won't be desired up there. The fundamental dichotomy between a vertical person and a horizontal person, remains. But, everyone will be perfectly happy. Knitted together, some 'stitches' farther away from each other, but all really needing each other. No cause for feeling inferior. No cause for feeling superior. God did it all: we just match up based on rapport. Hence, we remain unequal.
Due to this incompatibility, it is a Burden to be Ruler; it is a burden to be ruled. We already know the latter now, well. What we never understand is the burden of ruling, since most of us are not in that category, so have no appreciation of it. But we do have a lot of understanding about the burden of being, parents. And being a Ruler, is like being Parent. By comparison to the ruler, the ruled are like children in their understanding. So love alone motivates the ruler to want to be a ruler. His status is just necessary so he can show that love. Else, being a ruler is the worst of all occupations: for the children never grow up. They age, but the difference in wisdom between them, remains. Just as, we will never be as wise as God. So, He Must Love The Burden Of Having Us; we, in turn, get to choose how much we love growing up toward Him. Gap always remains; but it can be a lot smaller! Our choice.
As a consequence, then, the vertical people grown by the Holy Spirit to Pleroma, become the Rulers. By then, they will have learned to love the burden of rule, as a way to Express Love. Love for God; love for mankind. Analogous to how Christ loved the Church, and gave Himself as a Substitute for her. See? It's not glamor, it's not merit, it's Love. (Eph 5: Greek preposition huper means always "as a substitute for", not the satanically-chopped off "for" you always see in translation. Seminaries stridently teach the full meaning of huper, so there is no excuse for chopping it off in translation.]
When all is over, we'll all be standing before Him, at the Bema. Then, most of us for the first time will understand how irrelevantly we lived our lives. Preoccupied with people and things, making big stinks over them, will seem irretrievably horrible. Like Peter responded in Luke5:8, we'll long to be distant from Him for quite a different reason — we ourselves will consider it unjust to HIM that we be close. We miffed our opportunity to get close down here, and now, well.. it's not fair to be close in eternity. So we will be the ones clamoring the most for distance. Because, we still will not be compatible, except in a rudimentary way: same nature, but still not the same thinking atop that nature. Undeveloped, we will find the closeness unfair and thus uncomfortable. See, you don't become an automaton in the eternal state. See, you still can choose, and can sin, but never will. And then, it will be deemed unfair to HIM to be close.
Only God's power makes you a winner (Bible keyword) in this Trial. What the eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, all that He has prepared for those who love Him, 2Tim4:8. To get there you must learn to THINK like the Son, for the Objective is to train you to be a king under the King Of Kings. No amount of works can train you.
So, what to 'do'? As noted earlier, start breathing 1 John 1:9 as often as you think of it, and study regularly under whomever God has appointed to be your right (males only!) pastor; and, as often as you can, ponder over and use what you are learning! That's really the entire procedure. No cookie-cutter procedures like the Old Testament had, are required. (GodSystem.htm is a good synopsis of the procedure, easy to grasp. 1 John's Outline of God's Script has more details; LordvSatan3.htm explains the dynamics of this procedure in your life, and how Christ is Our Precedence now, not the Mosaic Law. LordvSatan4.htm covers the macro historical impact of it.)
Consequently, the one who keeps on electing to know Him, will face increasing pressure from all opposition: within himself, within the world, within his own family (remember what the Lord said about that), within the demon realm (sending thoughts, sicknesses, etc. á la Book of Job). So, Torture. So, Hell. So, Cross. What does it take to make you stop wanting to know Him, growing believer? is the Cross-Examination.
The Royal Spiritual Life is 100% invisible, but it's political in the extreme, from Satan (&Co.)'s point of view. For we are in training to become Kings, and that goal's completion seals Satan's doom. Our Lord heads a Kingdom-in-progress, which will be a federation of nations, lasting forever. DueDisclosure.htm seeks to orient the reader to the Diplomatic dilemma in which we find ourselves. So even when you brush your teeth, it's a big deal. God has a very precise will for your life, because people will be blessed or cursed, depending on what YOU are thinking. It's just like diplomacy: the wrong words at the wrong time, create war; the right words at the right time, create peace. Since those associated with you will be blessed or cursed depending on whether YOU are growing, it becomes quite important, who is associated with you; where you live; what you do for a living; whether you even go to the bathroom. Kings are important; heirs are important. Nothing is small. So: depending on GOD to direct you or do things is a must. As my pastor likes to put it, An ambassador does not provide for himself; he does not speak for himself; he represents the country from which he is sent; he has his instructions in writing. So 100% of you depends 100% on God. So 100% of the time, God should be running the show, and He'll have an opinion on everything.
Earlier in the page, we saw that Satan discovered God not only elected Hell for Himself simply because He elected to create, but also that He wants His souled creation to Elect The Same, in order to Have Intimacy With Him. Hence the Son did so Elect, going to the Cross, Philippians 2:5-10. So, for "us" (moniker for Church, in New Testament, especially Hebrews), the issue is the same. Because, this is the heart of the Trial: How Much Rapport with The God Who Elected Hell, do you want? Since you cannot ever make good on any election, being a puny human — God Makes Good on your election. Because, you are electing, HIM. You get what you Want, with God. Both ways: you elect to know Him, you will. You elect not to know Him, you won't. His Power, your choice. There is no middle ground.
Failure will be constant, but also success. our "Matthew 4" won't be perfect, but rather, will have constant shortfall right alongside the Winnings of Thinking like Him. It's a side-by-side existence, not an erasure. Erasure is going on, but below-radar: beneath what you can see. Occasionally, you will glimpse it as you look back on something in your life, or someone else brings up something about you. By the end, like Paul you will know if you've completed the course (2 Timothy 4:8, I think). But by that point, it doesn't matter how 'good' you are: what matters, is that you Keep On Choosing Him. It's all you know, all you want, and nothing can dislodge it. That's the victory, in the Trial. That's your 'isaac', being sacrificed. Paul's relief was incredible, in 2 Timothy 4. So, that's what the Cross meant to Christ: Hebrews 12:2. So that's what it will be, for those of us who finish our own footraces to the end (Hebrews 12:1, Greek, in context).
My pastor classifies the thinking patterns one uses from learning Scripture into "Ten Problem-Solving Devices". You can read a brief description of them in Question #4 of TULpV.htm. (Or access "Tulips?" from "Basics" box of Home Page, pick "V" there, then scroll down to Question #4.) The whole congregation has been hearing about them for 20+ years, so probably most of us are trained in using these devices. For a long time, I thought that the more 'advanced' devices ought to play in front, i.e., PSD #10, "Occupation with Christ", means frontal thoughts 'play' at that high a level — but, no — they play in back. Under. Motivating. 2 Corinthians 5.
What plays in front, are the Truths themselves, like it says in Psalm 89:14-15, and "full of Grace and Truth" in John's Gospel. So in your fight, you are motivated by loving Him, but the first five PSDs (1 John 1:9, Filling, Faith-Rest/Perception, Grace Orientation, Doctrinal Orientation) are always in front. Objective. So you are like Adam, then: naming the 'animals' in your life, classifying, remembering. The power of that is incredible. No wonder truth held Christ together on the Cross, and He kept on claiming it, naming it, too: Psalm 22:6! No wonder, then, that His Thought Replies to the sins lacerating Him, were so Pleasing to Father. As you practice these thought patterns using whatever Doctrine you've learned under your own pastor thus far, you will come to see for yourself how satisfying, it is — just like Paul prays for, in Ephesians 3:15-21!
Just as shown in the above MISTRIAL section bullets, the Royal Spiritual Life really is a Ruling. You are your own kingdom, and are king of it. Your thought life is toward Father and very very busy, even while you brush your teeth. You are constantly ruling on every thought you have, every incoming thought, temptation, action, external idea that hits you. This thought process becomes lightning fast and fluent. The above 10 Problem-Solving Devices (or whatever classification you're learning under your own pastor) become extremely swift, instinctive. Even in your sleep. You learn to be listening for whatever doctrinal recall the Spirit gives you, and as you age, it's astonishing how He takes peculiarly-apt snippets of verses in many parts of the Bible, and recalls them all to your mind at once. And you understand both the meaning, and why you got it! Instantly! Of course, you can then prove what you just learned, in Bible. It becomes very easy to understand Verbal Plenary Inspiration, how He could communicate and the Bible writers could write, Scripture. All this awaits one who grows up in Him. Nothing like it anywhere. All else in life, good or bad, is anticlimactic.
For the Truth is full-spectrum, so the Relationship with Infinite God must be also. Bad truth, good truth, any truth, because truth. Max negative facts and relationships at one 'end'; max positive, at the other. Cross is essentially a Matching between negative and positive truths. For, Infinity means Full-Spectrum. Not, that God must Himself be bad in order to be infinite, but that He must HOLD bad. You know: the structural integrity is no greater, than what can knock it down. Well, nothing can knock God down. Nothing can knock Positive Truth down, not even, negative truth. So, in your own life, there's this side-by-side quality to the battle, and it's supposed to be constant. Just like Matthew 4, the back-and-forth; just like the Cross, 'making love'. Embracing, not erasing. So that even the sterile bads, bear kids! Isaiah 54:1! Ephesians 2!
Omniscience knows and experiences All At Once. All bad, all good. What happened a billion years ago, is still 'live' to Omniscience. What happens a billion years from now is likewise 'live', to Omniscience. God is One Big Now by Nature. It's always the 'present', to Him. So think: to be close to Him necessitates your own soul become inured to bad, as well as good, since once you die down here, your new self will be Huge. As a Gift from Father to Son, even the smallest of us will be far greater than the greatest of all the greats in history, down here. You will have thinking abilities and a nature like Christ Himself. So you will experience the way He does, 1 John 3. So the goal down here, is to get a Structure Of Tolerance, kinda like a building (Bible keyword). So all that increase in ability and nature, won't overwhelm your soul. So getting what's 'bad' in your life down here, will increase your ability to have Rapport with God Who Experiences the Cross at All Times. See: the issue of having bad stuff is way beyond the question of did you misbehave, lol. God elected Hell for Himself, so you will know it better once you've died: in order to know HIM better.
The hallmark event in a believer's life is when God becomes more important to him than his own life. If he never reaches an all-consuming interest in God for Himself, he will remain of the masses. If he does switch over from the childhood idea that morality is spirituality to an interest in God for Himself, his life will be marked by conflict which only increases as he ages. At that point, he's a soldier and no longer a civilian. There's no going back. Only defeat or victory, awaits.
Catching onto this embracing-of-the-bad is the most difficult aspect of spiritual growth. It seems that if life with God is growing, things ought to be progressively-more peaceful. The opposite is true, and it's a real shocker. You can quickly confirm that the opposite is true, by viewing any Bible hero. Especially, Christ: His Life Got Progressively Worse, culminating in that worst-of-worst experiences, Javelins! Cross! So, too, all the others: Heb 11 makes a big point of that fact. Review any biography of an Old Testament hero, or New Testament hero. They all get worse lives, the more they grow. Growth means war by nature; we learn that even as kids, i.e., 'growing pains'. So you should be getting worse, if you're growing. Satan fakes us all out with the idea that niceness outside means things are nice, inside. Also, God does give the believer plenty of resting periods, and the material prosperity to go with them.
Maybe you've noticed that in the 20th century, men who fight in wars returned home quite changed. They've just been through a hellish experience which alters how they value life. They are either deeper in their souls, or are so shaken they don't recover. It therefore becomes quite difficult to readjust to civilian life with its total ignorance of war. The petty preoccupations and sheer silliness of 20th-century civilian life is unsettling. For they have truly experienced a 'hell'. So after awhile, they reminisce about their time in the war, look up old war buddies, and glorify that time. Because, the peace they now have, is somehow 'empty'. Notice how they once were compatible with civilian life, but no longer are, upon return. Because, they are bigger in their souls (or more wigged out) — than those around them. Some finally adjust to the dichotomy. Many do not.
Same, with respect to the spiritual warfare. As one grows spiritually, one's periphery becomes more and more intolerable, because the self is becoming deeper, but the others remain 'civvies'. Compatibility lessens. Satan counts on that problem to knock believers out of the Pleroma Witness Box, and to keep the masses, well below it.
So during this hallmark period, there is a great deal of zig-zagging, as your new motive of actually wanting to live for Christ, coalesces and gains dominance. The stage lasts a good while, maybe decades. It's often a war of attrition.
Once this hallmark stabilizes in the Pleroma stage, what is the relationship to God, to life? Relationship to God is Total. Relationship to life, is Expression of that Total. All you want, is to live and eventually die well for FATHER, just as Christ did. The Pleroma stage also lasts some years, maybe even decades. However, its salient attitudinal feature is that you literally die to this world, even while living; the world has become unattractive, but even more, irrelevant. You don't become antisocial or a hermit. The world and its needs are completely under the spiritual life. Doesn't mean you stop sinning, of course. Does mean your perspective is a habitual thinking in spiritual terms. Everything reminds you of some Bible principle in some way, instinctively. The 'definitions' in your head are all spiritual. So the erstwhile pull of the world and its interests, has largely died off.
Your values are like Paul's: Living, Christ! Dying, Profit! Concomitantly, just as Christ died for us as an expression of Total Rapport with Father, so you will. FATHER IS FIRST in your Thinking, not necessarily doing. Because, He trained to Die Like A Lamb. And so will you. It boils down to Total Subordination to God's will, which by then, you thoroughly know. The Training-to-die objective uses up maybe the rest of your life, the only item on the agenda, God's and yours. The fourth part of God's Trial Answer, coming up shortly, will further elaborate on that italicized sentence.
Think over Matthew 4. Satan tempted the Lord to use His Deity to do for the body, mankind. But the Lord refused each Temptation. Christianity buys Satan's mindset lock, stock, and barrel, historically. Those very few who didn't, no one will know.. until the Bema. So note carefully what was refused: works. Doing stuff for bodies, but not for souls. Souls which only want goodies, but not the Giver. So, what can BE done for them?
DIE. Like a Lamb. The Thinking Strength And Scope Required To Do That, best prepared Christ to get the Total Rapport He wanted and needed with Father, so that He could Think The Thoughts Father Liked And Enjoyed, to Justify all us other bodies, get it? That's a Priestly Thing, FOR FATHER. The real need the Body has, is for a Priest to justify its own existence. This, because 99.9% of believers will not want the intimacy Christ bought for us, so it seems to go unused. But, (salt principle, crop principle, Luke 8) Pleroma believers will think so pleasingly, they are made rulers so the rest of the Body of Christ, is justified. Moreover, the Thought Flow from them, will be the 'currency' of happiness for the rest of the Body; even as, the Thought Flow From Christ is our 'currency': Scripture, 1 Corinthians 2:16, Hebrews 4:12, Philippians 2:5, and many other passages.
See, Christ paid for salvation and for us to get His Thought pattern. Most of us 'buy' being saved, but not His Thought Pattern. So there is a second 'saving' to be done: rescuing us all from this negativity. We will heartily regret not having learned Him down here, once we are all at the Bema. So what saves us from that regret? The Pleroma will have the thought pattern: it's an Economy, a Polity of Thinking about God. For we are Priest nations, and so we need that Thinking for our 'currency', forever. It comes through the Pleroma, so the rest of us can get the thinking we had refused down here, anyway. Just as, we got saved anyway, despite our sins, so we get 'rescued' (another meaning of "saved", Greek sozo) from our negative lives, down here via the Pleroma. God gives the victory, even as He gave us Christ. What a Plan!
Here's a secular analogy. Every nation has a kind of culture, a shared set of ideas which everyone in it, has in common. Most of the people in that nation are low, relatively uncultured and uncouth. So the leaders have the 'job' of inspiring and communicating the nation's ideals, so that the Thinking in the polity as a whole, is healthy. Those low are inspired by what they hear; they don't understand most of what they hear, but they are motivated to try, and thus they learn more than they'd otherwise know. This makes them happier. In eternity, of course, the difficulties we experience down here, won't exist. But the hierarchy, will. So the scope of thinking well will be smaller in those low, versus the scope in the leaders. Everyone perfect, but not everyone of the same soul 'size'. So, the resultant synergy of thinking transmits thinking to those low, such that in aggregate, FATHER HEARS a higher quality of thinking at every level, than would otherwise exist. Perfect-small, becomes perfect-bigger. Dynamically increasing, every day.
So in the Pleroma stage, one develops an absolute desire to be a king, in order to generate such thinking and thus serve Father, Son, and make your kingdom, happy. So it will be for the believer who grows up in Him. For we share all He is and has, Isaiah 53:10-12 (in the original-language texts, especially v.11 in the LXX). For better, or for worse. From cave to cross, not even a blip on the radar of the world's attention. So chuck all those pseudo-Christian rah-rah ideas. If you want to know God, it will be a plodding slog. If you want to know Satan, join the rah-rah crowd and fantasize yourself all the way to 1 John 5:16, followed by shame at the Bema. For better or for worse, those are your alternatives. And you will get what you choose.
See God's Genius? Freedom from merit claims, Freedom from demand, so Righteousness retains its true Gift Character. For it's a 'gift' to God, to BE God. So it's a Gift to Christ, to Convert His Humanity into being the Indescribable Gift to God, Qorban: see Romans 5, last half. Most of the human race votes on Satan's side. To them, this is not a good life to have. So, they won't have it.
4. For Love subordinates, hatred insubordinates, so DEPENDENCE is true INDEPENDENCE. The fact that you get whatever relationship-to-God you 'vote' to have, is an expression of LOVE on God's part. The real heart of God, is His Absolute Desire For Togetherness. Flat. No conditions. No separations. This, because He is Infinite, which means, all-encompassing. No high too high, no low too low, no small too small, no ugly too ugly, no beautiful too beautiful. It's Absolute. Hence, Love. Hence, Truth. Hence, Righteousness and Justice. Hence, all His Other Attributes. Christ got 100% Togetherness, even though in His Humanity, with Father, on the Cross. LvS4d.htm's "Combat" link explains how. For now, understand this: He Wanted the Absolute Togetherness, and paying for us was the way to get it. It wasn't a sacrifice to Him, but joy: Heb12:2, a chapter all about togetherness; a warning chapter, lest the reader miss Chapter 4's theme of Togetherness, by agency of the Spirit, by means of Doctrine, in the believer. Forever.
Because Togetherness is the heart of God's Sovereign Nature, He cannot be dented. So He doesn't 'need' the Cross, to make Him 'whole', etc. Rather, we need the Cross, because the problem of finity, which sin merely makes hopeless, is separation. (Bible keyword: "far", i.e., in Ephesians 2.) Being a separate but finite person necessarily means a thought pattern which is independent of God, perfect or not. So the finite or sinning creature's own choices all naturally separate away from God. So, how to Pour In God's Own Thinking TO the creature, so Togetherness can occur? That's what the Holy Spirit did TO Christ, such that He reached Total Togetherness While On The Cross: "the Way, the Truth, and the Life". [See "Combat" link in LvS4c.htm for details.] Thus the promise of Jer31:31-34 is Fulfilled In Him, And Thus Transmissible To Us. Because the problem between God and man is TWO-fold, not just one, Romans 3:23. We come short.. not merely sin. So this gap, how to solve it, so we can be together? Obviously, salvation wouldn't be such a big deal, if it only meant avoiding hell...
This Togetherness Truth underlies all others, and is chiefly communicated in Bible by a bizillion marital oneness techniques, from Genesis 1:2 forward. You won't easily see them in translation, because Bible publishing committees have tended to be ascetic or politically-correct; the bizillion marital/sexual innuendoes, embarrass them; so they fuzzed over what Bible really says. So use the original-language texts. Also, many of these techniques can't BE properly translated, especially since God communicates foundational doctrines using foundational characteristics of the original language. For example, in Genesis 3:22, there's this very humorous use of the preposition min, which can't be conveyed in English without including the following meaning, somehow: Oh, the man is BORN, now, independent from us (lit., out from among us), free! knowing good and evil. Very fine sarcasm. Total love in it.
Because the Holy Spirit created the Thinking In Him, we can also be "near" God (another Bible keyword, i.e., in Ephesians 2). As LordvSatan3.htm explains in detail, A Device Now Exists To Unite us puny, running-away-from-God sinners, in Him (per Ephesians 3:15-21, 4:11-16, inspired Greek): Scripture, His Thinking, Word of God, "Christ in you, the confident expectation of Glory". [Well, that's a multiple-entendre verse.] We get the position in Him at salvation, just like the Old Testament people did (Romans 6), but we can also get the Thinking He Thought (Romans 8). Old Testament people couldn't get that Thinking, since Christ had not yet completed the Cross (John 7:39); so at most, they could only be with Him (i.e., verse in Acts(?) where Christ tells disciples HS is with them, but will be in them, not many days hence). Sin was merely part of the fuel used to create this thinking: the imputation and judgement of sins on Him spurred a whole lot of Thinking in 'reply' to them. Judicially, the Beauty of His Thinking in reply was a 'sweet savor' to Father (Isaiah 53:11, but really, all of Chapters 53~55 are on this topic). So, 'paid' the entire opportunity cost of creation. So, anyone can be saved. So To Get The Togetherness Via His Thinking, After Salvation. Just as He did. For He is not ashamed to call us, "brothers" (Hebrews 2).
"Opportunity cost" is what you could have had in value from a piece of property. Determining opportunity cost is the stuff of lawsuits, of sales transactions, of insurance, of politics (i.e., the nonsense about slave reparations). So, think: judicially, even though Nothing Dents God, it's nonetheless true that as GOD He deserves the BEST USE of His Property. Ironically, if Christ could be developed to PAY that best use, then any use of the actual property, becomes Profitable. Ironically, if Christ could be developed to PAY that best use, the Thinking In Him thus developed gives Him perfect Rapport with His Beloved Father. Despite being in His Humanity. Despite foregoing the use of His Own Deity to accomplish the same result. See? It's not about sin, but about Togetherness.
Had no one ever sinned, it was still a problem of getting The Thinking poured into them. But Satan (&Co.) sinned, and added a whole lot of rebellion, as well. Since man is created in part to prove Satan (&Co.) wrong, the 'cost' of man is also all of Satan (&Co.)'s waste, so to speak. It would have to be, lest the judicial value owed on God's property, be shorted. Note again: God is not hurt, not matter what happens, since Togetherness Is Already Total. But justice is justice. Hence, the full opportunity cost must be paid. Which, is a boon to Christ, for then He has to Get Full Togetherness to be able to 'pay'. His Dream Come True, Hebrews 12:2, Hebrews 5:9, Luke 22, John 17.
The DDNA of Oneness on the Cross, Funds Us to Get Oneness in Him
Think of the sheer thrill of knowing that due to sins hitting you on the cross, New Beautiful Thoughts are 'manufactured' in 'reply' to those lacerating imputations and judgements. Thoughts you wanted to think, rather than reacting to the horror of the sins themselves, rather than reacting to Father hitting you with them, rather than reacting to the horrific pain and repugnant judgement hitting alongside. New Beautiful Thoughts then are the 'children' of this horror. So that makes good on the 'parents', Isaiah 54:1! So how Pleased is Father, yehwah haphets dakk'o heheli, im tasim asham naph'sho, yireh zera ya'arik yamim, Isaiah 53:10? Two parents of those Beautiful Thoughts: one parent, the imputed sins and their judgements, but the Other Parent, Christ, Who received them implanted (raped, really, Hebrew euphemistic verb anah). The Superior Parent is Him. FATHER WILL ALWAYS SEE THOSE THOUGHTS.. FOREVER! Now you understand, 'priesthood'.
So, the 'children' have His Characteristics, a kind of Divine DNA, replicable in us His Children; the imputations and judgements are all dead, so don't have any 'genes' to transmit. So via the Holy Spirit depositing His Script in our heads, John 4:23, 14:26, to realize John 15-17, hence Romans 5:5, Romans 12:1-3, 2 Peter 3:18, Ephesians 3:15-19, 4:13, 1 Corinthians 2:16 — we too can have these thoughts in 'reply' as we face the problems in our lives, whether they are our fault, or not! That's Togetherness. Flat. Flattened, really.. but who cares?
As a consequence, this birthing process accomplished the only 'section' of uniting between Father and Son which had remained: the knowledge of sin. As God, He knows sin; but as Human, in order to be the Living Sacrifice, He must be SINLESS. That creates a paradox: if He's sinless, then He doesn't know sin, so is not wholly 'one' with Father, Who does. (Omniscience knows everything, including sin, so wouldn't have to sin itself, to get that knowledge.) So what to do? 2 Corinthians 5:21! Impute and Judge all sin in Him, and that completes the 'oneness', so long as His Humanity also doesn't sin the meanwhile. And He didn't!
So now the transformation of our own souls can happen in the same way, Romans 12:1-3, Greek (see Rom121-3.htm). This realizes the promise of sharing plunder in Isaiah 53:12 (LXX keyword merizw there ties to Romans 12:3, Ephesians 4:16). He was plundered so we are plunder for Him, since the sins were ours. So now we can plunder His Thinking and become like Him, "sired" by the Holy Spirit in His Thinking, main theme of 1 John.
So the Rest of Our Book, Our Word, The Beautimous Bible, is about bringing man Back Together. The demons make fun of the Togetherness Purpose by promoting phallic cults, which were not at all fun — the sex was mandated, or you were sacreligious. (Same is true today, but now you're not cool, etc. if you don't 'do' it.) Paul, of course, the only perpetual virgin, is given to write more about marital oneness, than anyone else; well, maybe John's 'portion' of that disclosure, rivals Paul's. The Lord is totally adamant about togetherness, in John 14-17: central focus of New Testament epistles, is to elaborate on what the Lord said, i.e., as John 15,17 record. Ephesians is a letter about God's superior Begetting, parallelling Euripedes' play, "Ion". So you can see for yourself, that Togetherness is the entire point, from God's 'side'.
Togetherness is a function of Rapport, not proximity. You can be in the same room with someone and yet be a million miles away. So Thinking is what makes two individuals, "close". God is Infinite, so therefore IN everything, and Sovereignty Loves that fact. Yet, what about the enjoyment BY "everything" of that fact? As Paul notes in Galatians 3:19-20, God is One of the two parties. So What Intimacy Can Be Shared By God to the object? If He had just zapped us, we'd not really be sharing intimacy, because the zapping happened apart from our choosing it. Sure, we'd be obedient little Stepford wives.. how much fun is that? Satan finds it fun, but God does not. Religion finds it fun, but God does not. Further, until Christ's Thinking, Freely-Developed, was completed, how much transmission of intimacy, could occur? Very little. So at most based on what truth one heard (shema), via the Old Testament external observances, one could have a human-like Intimacy With God. But Now, we can be IN God, as much as He is in us. Indwelling, so to get Filling of His Son's Thinking. So Christ in us, position, moment of salvation; but next, Christ in us, because His Thinking is in us. So no longer a million miles away, even though together in the Holy of Holies.
Ergo our Salvation is indeed So Great, as the author of Hebrews explains from Hebrews 2, forward. We Can Be Totally Intimate via the Holy Spirit pouring His Thinking into us, too (Romans 5:5, Ephesians 3:15-19, etc). Question is, how much of that intimacy does the individual want? However much he wants, he'll get, because God Wants It, too. But Love never coerces. Coercion and togetherness don't 'go' together.
Hence verses like Hebrews 11:6, usually translated "without FAITH it is impossible to please Him", exist. FAITH IS TOGETHERNESS. You BELIEVE IN. That's a vote to be WITH, IN, TOGETHER. Faith needs a Reason, and Doctrine is Ho Logos, Reason. Truth, organized, answering everything, God's Attribute, developed in Christ, so now available to us in writing. Believe it! As a result, just as IT held Christ together on the Cross, thus doing the greatest work of all time which was no work at all, so also, will it produce works IN you. That's the work James is talking about, in James 1~2, and if anyone would bother to notice that 2:22's intransitive verb sunergew means Doctrine Is Doing The Work, we'd not misuse James to feed our egos. [Intransitive verbs were given to Greek villians in classical Greek drama, to illustrate that what they did, accomplished nothing. It's a cute way of inserting the principle of Isaiah 54:1, into a verse. Paul does the same thing, in Romans 8:28, and allusively, in Philippians 2:12-13.]
Doctrine gives you Reason to believe, and believing is wanting the Togetherness, so the Holy Spirit creates you in Christ, which was God's purpose, all along: Ephesians 2:10's Ionic dative of purpose, epi ergois agathois. ("Fit Bride", explains.) After all, God is United, so everything else should be too! 2 Corinthians 13:14! He He He .. heh, They Have So Much Rapport, you almost can't tell Them apart! Yeah, A PART OF, not 'apart'. Satan wants, "apart". God wants and already is, A PART OF, and everything is already A PART OF HIM — but for the thinking...
Thus Biblical heroes aren't heroes because of any works. They are heroes due to faith: see Hebrew 11's roster. Read Bible for yourself, and ask as you read, What Did These People Really 'Do'? Abraham, what works did he really do? Believe: see Romans 4. Moses, what did he really DO? Believe. Everyone else, didn't, which is why the Lord wanted to destroy the people, and start over with Moses (see end of LordvSatan3.htm, which has cites). David, what did he do? Got himself in a whole lot of trouble! But how did he defeat Goliath? With Belief. You don't think those little pebbles knocked out Goliath due to David's skill, do you? So also, any hero: believe, is what's recorded. Not charity works, not witnessing, not singing, not chanting or rituals, but believing. Because, if you want Togetherness, you hear Doctrine, and believe it: shema, Yisroel, 2 Corinthians 5.
You do, based on what you believe. So if you do charity work or singing or some ritual or good deed or "x", you believe in it. So you are together with it. Note that well: together with it, not God. By saying you must do it as a condition of being good with God, then it is the 'god', instead of God. For it is the condition. So it gets your intimacy, your attention — not God. So the more you do it, the farther away you are from God. So intimacy with fig leaves grows, hence distance from God grows, Isaiah 64:6. So notice what you don't believe: you don't believe in learning the Word. So you don't have faith in it. Instead, abusing the Word on works, you believe rather in the works, like Cain believed in his vegetables. So you use the Word to justify what you believe in. It's just an excuse. What do you think God will say at the Bema to folks with such beliefs, especially since Thinking, not works, paid for sins on the Cross? Those folks are busy thinking their many do's will garner them a reward. Yep, a small one. Yep, distance will be their reward. Saved, small-of-soul, not very compatible though perfect. So far away from Him, but close to things they will be doing forever.
Ergo the very sanctified sarcasm in Hebrews 6:11. The author writes, (corrected translation) "and we long for each of you to show the same EAGER diligence [in learning the Word, as the v.10 pastors do in teaching Word], Face-to-Face With/motivated by Our Full Certainty, Our Hope until Completion" [by death or Rapture, whichever occurs first]. "Hope" is a Bible moniker for Christ and His Thinking; "Full Certainty" is plerophoria — relative of our friend, Pleroma, another moniker for Christ and His Thinking, stressing The Certainty that we have His Thinking in Writing. Motivation based on HIS Thinking, not based on works, is stressed. [See also Hebrews 10:22 in context; verse uses plerophoria again, blistering passage; calls it the Real Good and the Real Good Deeds, compared to works (10:24-29)! Plerophoria is used in the Old Testament as well, so you can tell its meaning from all those other verses.] Verse 12 goes on to complete the sentence: "so that you STOP becoming [more] 'dull' [of hearing — references 5:11's nothros, a dull knife]; and instead, [become] imitators of those [in v.10] who by means of Doctrine-and-nonemotional-fortitude, are in process of inheriting the promise/prize/escrow deposit." Whew. Of course, everyone knew the 40 year countdown to Temple destruction was almost over. Parents have to punish, when kids don't learn the easy way.
[Exegetical notes: Greek words cannot be translated using the stupid translation rule of one English word per Greek word. What passes for one Greek word includes case endings and other stuff! How to know it's sarcasm: a) in v.10, the author is contrasting the good pastors, with the bad students. Also, b) given that "thumia" compound begins v.11 and nearly ends v.12. Look up thumos: oh, what a scorcher, yikes! Of course, the insult began back in 5:11 with nothros, a knife not kept SHARP (pointed reference to Hebrews 4:12's machaira), so it doesn't kill (arrogance) well, thus harms the animal on which it is used (self). My pastor spent a good week on 5:11! Oh: Hebrews 6:12's "promise" is a pointed reference to the "Rest" theme of Hebrews 4 (Hebrew equivalent means "seven"). The word "eagerness" is a pointed reference to Hebrews 4:11. The word "doctrine" aka "His Thinking" is pistis, and "doctrine" is its more usual Bible meaning: content of belief. I forget how my pastor translates machrothumia (early yr. 2000 tapes, on 1 Corinthians 13:4, he explained etymology in detail); but the term's stress is on nonemotional fortitude despite clamor. Standard lexicons are scarcely helpful, but note from the compound, the essential meaning: machro+thumia, withstanding anger. Thumos is onomopoetic, huffing and puffing in anger, hatred, lust for self-satisfaction against some enemy. So the writer depicts his group as huffing and puffing with longing to see their audience stop their huffing and puffing over their dead works (see also Hebrews 6:1ff, 9:14ff)! So the EAGERNESS and HASTE that spoudazo (Hebrews 4:11, 6:11 is noun) connotes, fits well!]
His Thinking is in Writing. What brings us closer to God, is to learn to Think like Him. That's why we have the Book. First meaning of "Faith" in either Hebrew or Greek is "what is believed", rather than the act of believing, itself. Ergo Hebrews 11:1: if What is Believed is His Word, estin.de pistis elpizomenwn,; that's a Trial Issue which makes Togetherness so it gets tested, hupostasis pragmatwn, Christ's Thinking On Trial; which trials constitute elegchos ou Blepomenwn, Evidence Unseen.
So it becomes extremely important to examine why Holy God totally subordinates to creation. He wanted to do that. Since God IS Truth, it must be true that Subordination is Righteous. So in God, the Objective and the Wanting (subjective) are identical. This question drives theologians crazy, because they don't understand the Role of Love, as an Expression of God's Sovereignty. My pastor spent 53 years examining this issue, and in the daily Bible classes kept on revisiting the question, refining it each time. By the end of his ministry, when Alzheimer's took over, he finally GOT it all, and despite that disease, presented it to us: "Love is the Integrity of God!" he shouted in his May 7, 2000 class. That solves the conundrum which has puzzled theologians for centuries, so let's look into it...
God's Election to Create is First and Foremost, a Sovereign Election of Total Subordination; for, His Election means He must bear all the shortfall in creation — and there's no way around that, since creation is finite — so His Election means He Wants, Loves To Bear All Shortfall Forever. Else we'd not be here. Else there'd be no heaven, no hell — no creation, in the first place. There's no middle ground. The soul must be INterminable, for God is interminable; hence only an interminable soul would be a COMPATIBLE Structure for Communication. Animals do not have souls; hence they can't know God, but we can. [This is not the place to debate what many consider self-consciousness and self-determination in animals, i.e., whether it is genuine, or 'trained' in the sense of socialization. That debate happens regularly in #philosophy channel on undernet, if you're interested.]
So His Election begs the question, which is the real heart of the Lord vs. Satan conflict, even beneath questions of merit vs. rapport: what does 'independence' mean? God has seemingly ceded His Independence, in that He elected to be saddled with us forever. God created an INDEPENDENT creation and upholds it, never interfering. Hell is but a subset of that whole. The Lake of Fire at the end of time is but a subset of that whole. So why would He do that? Satan thinks something must be wrong in God for Him to make the election He did. So, either God is lying and really needs creature approbation, or He is sadistic and loves seeing His creatures suffer. Or masochistic and wants to suffer, Himself.
God's answer is the opposite, of course, and His Answer is rooted in his nature as God. God is Trinity, so to be Triune is more than simply being of the same Infinite, Co-Equal Nature. In fact, that is the problem, a barrier to unity. See, Three Sovereigns. But Love subordinates in favor of the Love Object. So, it appears as though Sovereignty must be surrendered in order for Love to exist. Else, aloofness. Which ends up meaning, aloneness. What good is being independent, if alone? Not good that God should be alone: then there is no rapport. Subordination due to Love is, within Trinity, quite Justifiable: for They Are Equal. So it's not a surrender of Sovereignty, but an Exercise of Sovereignty. All this is covered in the "Hupostasis in Trinity" and "Fixes".
However, the issue of subordination and equality is the backdrop for the Justice Question of Shall We Create: for creation is necessarily inferior. Alikeness is required for Rapport to exist. There is no real alikeness between God and souled creation, except that both are persons. But the gap in Rapport is way too great. We just saw above that this gap was resolved on the Cross, and His Thinking can be deposited in us. However, notice that the meanwhile, we still remain inferior. The thinking we receive will be of Divine Quality, and our free will thus Freely Thinks God-Quality thoughts: but our soul 'size' is not Infinite in scope, ever. So it seems that to create, compromises Righteousness. Why isn't that true?
To see why, we go back to the Fact that They are Voluntarily Triune. They don't seek to be aloof from Each Other, but rather Subordinate due to Love, which is Justifiable, since Each One is of the Same Infinite Divine Essence. Love Expresses Itself Infinitely, Sovereignly BY MEANS OF total and utter Subordination to Each Other. What a paradox: Infinite, Holy, Perfect God is not free without subordination. Sure, as God He's free to choose or forego anything and everything at will. But to Not Subordinate would mean Love goes Unexpressed. The relationship God-to-God would then be Distant, Aloof, Alone. Ultimate 'macho man'. Not good! Opposite of Infinite Togetherness!
So what Expressions are there, except to GO LOW (Greek verb taipeinw), since God-to-God expressions are naturally maxed out, just by 'living', so to speak? So the Godhead is a Corporation, voluntarily entered into, 2 Corinthians 13:14. The God we know by His Self-Chosen Title of "Father", is true Head. To be in charge is a type of maximum subordination, as even any human parent or business owner can tell you. Next, the One we know by His Self-Chosen Title as "Son", demonstrates by that Title His Total, Infinite, Voluntary Subordination to "Father". And the One we know as "Spirit", likewise demonstrates the same Subordination via His 'motherly' Self-Chosen Title — and also His Self-Chosen Role with respect to Son.
New Testament writers constantly stress Their Mutual Inter-Subordination by means of deft wordplay. For example, "doulos" means both "slave" and "son". A famous play named "Ion" by Euripedes, is based on this dual meaning: "Ion" means venom, the 'output' of a snake, hence is a euphemism for semen. So, it's about a son of Apollo (MorningStar, to us, aka Satan) and a human, who was therefore made a slave in his temple (Delphi). The play is about the gradual uniting of mother and son: she had abandoned him because the god had raped her, and she was ashamed. Apollo had rescued the abandoned boy and put him in Delphi. Then, the god made her barren, so to orchestrate her coming to the Temple, and thus be reunited. At the end, the god 'atones' for his raping her by making all the Greeks come from this son. So Paul often uses this play to make analogies to the Real Son, and our sonship in Him: all of Ephesians is based on the play. Galatians 4 explains how we are slaves even though sons, but uses KURIOS to show our attitude is to parallel His. Other passages, too.
Other New Testament writers also use the double meaning of doulos in the same way: salutations, for example; Hebrews 5:8-9 allusively refers to slaveship even though huious (means son, but connotes heirship) is used. So think: if God the Son calls Himself SON, that means He Wants To Be Chief Slave Of Father. No limitations. Hence Philippians 2:5-10 and kindred passages, especially 1 Timothy 2:5, express Total Subordination. It sure must be wonderful, if as God, He wants to do it. Notice also how, since God is uncaused merit, that to gain or get merit, or to count toward Father, cannot be the motive. Well, what's left? LOVE.
So next note how "Father" ironically ends up being the One who does the Most Subordinating (Ephesians 1, Hebrews 1): for, He is the Head of the Corporation. Yet He gives all, to Son. Furthermore, all the burden of rule was on Him. So if He chooses His Own Son go to the Cross, it's Father's 'fault' it happened. Father did the imputing. Father did the judging: 2 Corinthians 5:21! Buck stops there: whatever other justification there may have been for a Cross, Father Could Have Rejected. In the final analysis, it was His Sovereign Choice. Now maybe Satan's viewpoint in Matthew 4 will make more sense when you read it; now maybe the Lord's Total Self-Denial will make more sense, as well. The entire Trial hinges on this fact: Father Could Have Chosen Otherwise.
To say "self-denial" is really a misnomer, helpful only to see the goal of Love's subordination. Fighting has two sides, and it makes all the difference which 'side' is your viewpoint. Fight for, or fight against. The latter is all negative. That's what Terminator does, so he has no life. No wonder he's a robot. The Lord fights for: for RAPPORT with Father, for Saving us; for Life, for Truth. It's not an "against" thought pattern. Kinda like trying to get the most yield on an investment, it's always pro some kind of result. Fighting for dependence, so fighting for dependents, get it? Heh: that's what parents do! That's what Rulers do! That's what Love does!
Notice that God lives "for" something. Just because He's God and Unsustained, doesn't mean He has no goals. Quite the opposite: because He is Infinite He has All Goals. Nothing is too small. So for Him, what works like "self-denial" in us, is but a Love Of Having It Be That Way. And being Omnipotent, He can of course wipe everything out and do it all differently. We'd not know. And the ultimate Justice issue is but one: does GOD get what GOD wants, whether Righteous or not? Why should GOD have to answer, to anyone? So, if He ever chose, He could just zap everything into something else. That's His Prerogative, and no contract or commitment can stop it. So when God promises something, it's because He WANTS to. Not because He has to. So even when maximally 'denying' Himself and 'going low', He's never forced, compromised, or shortchanged. It's just how He Expresses His Love. And we are the Blessed beneficiaries of The Godhead's Sovereign Choice of How They Express Subordinating Love For Each Other. So Love really is the Integrity of God, the Attribute which is simultaneously the Expression of His Sovereignty, Wholly Voluntary at All Times. All the other Attributes are 'passive'.
So Shall We Create? is a "Yes!" because then Creation is an Expression of Subordinating INTIMATE Love Among the Godhead, Toward Each Other. Therefore, no compromise due to our inferiority. God lives for God. Each Member of the Godhead lives for the Other One. That's how Love thinks, You are more valuable to me than I am. Look: isn't it far more wonderful, to live for God, rather than for mere self? No matter how great self may be? God sure thinks so. Now when you read David's breathless exclamation in Psalm 138:2b, "You have MAGNIFIED THE WORD above Your Own Person!" you can enjoy it more.
So the Godhead's Infinitely-Sovereign Choices are made for a reason; for a benefit; for, not against; for, not masochistic, at all. Rather, to Justify Total Intimacy, hence Total Love Expressions Toward Each Other, and hence, toward us. They can justify the choices because Each One is Co-Equal, so there is no real surrender of Sovereignty, because Equally Righteous. That is why we are made Divine Righteousness the moment we are saved (2 Corinthians 5:21, Romans 5:1, Romans 8:1-10). Thereafter at our end, it's a matter of learning Love, which means, learning the Truth ("Love" is moniker for Word=Bible, i.e., in Romans 5:5 and 1 Corinthians 13). God is Love, Indissoluble; so Truth is thoroughly 'saturated' (so to speak) with His Love Attribute. Hence, the progress of the spiritual life, is one of Progressive Subordination. Like in a marriage: Bride of Christ, Ephesians 5, 1 Corinthians, all of 1 John (menw as Love-Intimacy key, playing on John 14~17).
Marriage is a contract between two equals, really: equally human. To Justify this Contract, which creates an inequality (husband is head), both parties must subordinate to the desires of each other, and (frankly), to the extent this subordination is not happening, the marriage is miserable. Intimacy cannot be sustained, nor pleasant, nor fulfilling even when unpleasant, absent total subordination.
There's nothing at all attractive about fornication or adultery. Think about how the thrill of either derives from disobeying, from the forbiddeness. Criminals think like that. So, either one, is a putdown of Love, of subordination; the one so engaging, thus puts himself behind bars, makes himself more and more addicted to putting down, disobeying.. and accounts himself independent, hah! Just like Satan does. Any kind of habitual sin travels down this road, but religious and sexual sins speed along it, in Maseratis... Solomon likened it to dancing with mincing steps down to a grave: to Make Love To Death, in one of the Proverbs.
All fantasies of love being realized through non-marital sex degenerate into animalism, no matter how fantasized. For most of man's existence sex has thus been a sorrow: phallic cults trash sex; whether that kind or any other kind of rape, it violates, instead of loves (modesty is native to being female, so rape is always traumatic); people marry for the wrong reasons, lack integrity, so of course the sex pales; in short, sex was never designed, and never works, divorced from a sanctifying Love. Can't put a square peg in a round hole. Once you know this sanctifying love, you won't want to settle for anything less. And you'll never know this sanctifying love, if you trash yourself: Solomon found that out, the hard way (see Proverbs sex verses, and Song of Solomon: in the latter, he's the rejected one).
So too, in the relationship with God. It's a kind of spiritual sex, to learn His Thinking. So it is sanctifying. Book of Hebrews is quite bald about this, and of course Paul has no end of enjoyment explaining Head and Body, Husband and Wife. So if you fornicate with wrong interpretations of Bible, or other ideas of God, you will end up the way Solomon did: at first thrilled with yourself, and in the end, hard. Solomon finally recovered by turning back to God (Proverbs; he wrote Ecclesiastes when he was still 'out'). So can anyone else. It's not worth the self-righteous hardness which is the inevitable outcome of either lascivious or ascetism. For only God, sanctifies. And only total subordination, is happiness.
Husband is fulfilled by making the wife what he wants; she is fulfilled by being made what he wants. Personalities can be of any type, and the superficial postures can be anything, as well. But the joy of husbanding, is his; the joy of 'wife-ing' is hers. No other man 'uncovers' her, and the very thought that someone else would/did, is abhorrent. Same, in his mind: he wants no woman to touch him, but his wife. That's how it will become, in our relationship with Him Who is Our Husband. Nothing like it, in the universe! So why wait until you're dead, to get it, believer? Study in the Word starts that gorgeous process, Now!
Christ Himself set the precedent for all this. As God, He could have made His Humanity into what Father wanted. But No! He wanted FATHER to make His Humanity whatever FATHER wanted; wanted Spirit to make His Humanity whatever Spirit wanted. So both of Them teamed up, as it were, to make Son's Humanity what They wanted. Spirit played 'mother', just as in the restoration of Planet Earth (which Son made, as God, hint hint). So now, Father and Spirit team up to make Church what Son wants. Because Father Wants All To Go To The Son (Hebrews 1, Ephesians 1). So we can choose to be totally made by Them, rather than fantasizing our little, stupid, fornicatory ideas of making ourselves. If we persist in that, we will wake up one day down here or.. at the Bema, and like Solomon will cry in another Proverb, oh why didn't I listen to my Teacher! For Our Mentor, is the Holy Spirit.
So Love has to run the entire show, and Love is INTEGRITY: whatever else you are and can do, your love makes or breaks it. You have to hang together under pressure, see. Hence the pouring in of Truth increases the believer's own integrity, because God is Undivided by Nature, and Truth is Love, Romans 5:5. Which of course you won't get, if you don't choose it. So you grow in that Truth, and you grow thus in Love; hence your ability to reciprocate God's Love (Romans 5:5, again, 1 Corinthians 13, and many other passages), grows.
So, think: since Love subordinates, and without subordination there can be no intimacy; since God Himself Totally Subordinates to God; how can it be remotely desirable, to be 'independent', as man usually considers the term? Love Creates Dependence. For, Love subordinates. So, chooses to be dependent on the love-object's wants and needs. Therefore Love Substitutes the love-object's wants and needs, for his own. Hence, self-denial: acutely, to the extent of each such subordinative substitution; chronically, to the extent it is repeated. Scope of Love, Depth of Love, Integrity of Love, are thus demonstrated by means of these subordinative substitutions.
God Permanently Chose the 'hell' of Complete Dependence, when He Decreed to Create. That's why Romans 5:8 reads in Greek, God demonstrates His Love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ Died as a Substitute for us. The realization of this dependence had been always chosen by Sovereign Omniscience: there are no surprises, because what's happening a billion years from now, was always happening in Omniscience a bizillion years ago. So this Election To Create Is An Election To Subordinate, to Be Dependent. To live with finity's shortness (2nd prong of Romans 3:23), forever! Even with all those who totally reject Christ, so never once believed in Him, and never once believing in Him despite being in Hell. That's total subordination! Because, Total Love. And this total Love Is Realized, By Means Of Substitution. Greek preposition "huper" always and only means "as a substitute for". Never the translated, truncated "for" you see in English Bibles. For God is TOTAL, so the Payment for us was Wholly Substitutionary; even as, Christ was made the Substitute for our sins ON the Cross: Isaiah 52:13-54:1, 1 Peter 3:18, 2 Corinthians 5:21, etc.
As we just saw in the "DDNA" table above, every sin past present and future were literally made into 'parents' of His Son's Thinking on the Cross. The Payor is living — big theme in Romans 6 — so too, hell 'lives' forever. So all His Thinking COUNTERS every sin thought which will exist, as well as the past ones. The Structure of His Soul — and by extension, ours — will last forever. So the Thinking in that Structure, lives forever, side-by-side with all that hellish thinking. So the latter are made fuel, parents of the Beautiful New Thoughts which are constantly occurring before Omniscience. So, the entire matrix of thinking, which is a subset of All Truth, nothing 'shaved' or gerrymandered — is satisfying. "Filling all in all", as Paul puts it at the end of Eph1.
So the goal for the believer is to get this same Structure of Thinking built in him. Not, works or other folderol which is but a type of fornication. We are to know our Husband, not substitutes. Because, He substituted for us, so He now substitutes for everything else in life, 2 Corinthians 5:14-21. How paradoxical: dependence is suddenly Freedom, Galatians 5:1!
So 'independence' must be true hell: all alone, always fighting off love, always having to shield self from any 'shackles'; always needing to DISbelieve, always needing to deny faith, lest that 'independence', be lost to Love. This is the decision Satan and one-third of the angels, made. They have free will, and they keep on using their free will, to HATE. For 'independence' requires hatred, to sustain it. It's truly a fight for survival, not merely a question of merit or rapport. Because hatred needs to hate to preserve 'independence'. That's why either unbeliever or believer always feels a sense of loss or defeat when choosing to subordinate — especially, to God. It really IS a defeat — of hatred. One dot at a time, or many dots, but always the sense of defeat. Now you understand the Cross: Christ chose utter defeat, and that is why He is the Chief Victor, Isaiah 52:13-14 + 53:10-12, echoed in Philippians 2:5-10.
Satan, by contrast, is the one defeated and hating; he's very proud of that fact. But look: who can he worship? The mirror? Yep. What a sterile way to live! And to perpetuate that worship, everyone else has to be put down. So the thought pattern is necessarily ridicule, so to preserve that halo! Fighting against dependence, so fighting against dependents! Talk about frustration! No wonder the Koran, which a demon clearly authored (too much clever wordplay on the original languages of Scripture), uses "Iblis" as the title for Satan (name means "the frustrated one", in Arabic)!
So that's the decision facing us, too. It's a deeper question than merit or rapport, because it hits the heart of the self's relationship TO self. What kind of self do you yourself want to be? To the extent you want to love, you are choosing the 'hell' of ceding to others, subordinating to their wants and needs. To the extent you want to avoid the 'hell' of others having influence/authority/power over you, you must choose Hate, to survive.
Because we all are made by God, we all want to choose Love, but it always ends up having a 'price'; when this price is not met, self flips to hatred, so uses his 'sacrifice of love' to pride self on loving. That is a HATRED usage, not an expression of love — the love has been made a slave of hatred, because the 'price' condition is not met. Such is the most common of man's motives, and it's sourced in the same messianic choice Satan himself made, when he rebelled (Isaiah 14, Ezekiel 28, Matthew 4). So any price condition means hatred, not love, is operating. For only hatred sets prices. Love is innately foregoing, and has no 'sense' of conditions.
The two are entirely antithetical, and each has its own momentum. My pastor likes to use "fear" to illustrate the momentum of sin, which was born of hatred: "the more you surrender to fear, the more you fear. The more you fear, the greater the power of fear in your life." And so on. Well, that's true for anything, negative or positive. Trouble is, the hatred base is destructive, so its 'growth' actually shrinks the person motivated by it. An ever-increasing scope of externals 'threaten' independence, because hatred has to be used to perpetuate it.
So, when young, you didn't feel threatened by love; but at some point, it became a threat to your sense of freedom. Because, like everyone else, you learned to defend yourself against (perceived or real) encroachment. Thus love has a price. So, as time passes, as you bump against the price ceiling, you will be positive (choosing love), or negative (choosing hate). Thus the price changes. Successive positive choices raise the 'price'. Successive negative choices lower the 'price'. Until, at the end, either you regard love as PRICELESS.. or, worthless. See Isaiah 55.
There is no middle ground, because there is no middle ground in God Himself. For Him, it's an Infinite Choice. We aren't infinite, but it's still a total choice. In practice, we are always veering toward love or hatred, subordination or insubordination, and the sense of degradation one feels when subordinating, reveals the true nature of the choice one faces. It then becomes a question of 'what price subordination', the tradeoff between the Desire for Togetherness, and the Desire for Separateness.
That's why this is a Divorce Appeal Trial. The entire issue is about separation versus intimacy, Hate versus Love. The latter requires subordination; the former requires insubordination. Satan (defense attorney) argues that if Love is as God has said and chosen with respect to Himself, such a standard should not be imposed on creation, which is unable to live up to it; that creation is unfairly condemned to hell, if it rejects that standard. God in turn explains to him (and us) that the rejection itself is completely destructive to the being, whether God or finite souled creature. If God Himself did what Satan had done, God would be totally wrecked inside, whether or not any loss of abilities occurred (so it's not a merit issue, either), dependent forever afterward on hatred to preserve whatever 'independence' was needed. Hence, true hell. Hence, a Lake of Fire; hence those who reject God by never believing in His Son, choose such a life. So, they get it. Hence those believers who choose less than total subordination by the time of their deaths, will be more separated (distant, though saved) — for, that is what they chose. [Sidenote for the prickly: the expression "in heaven" is used in the Bible to denote with God as a general status, i.e., Paul calls us politeuma of Heaven, in Ephesians. So the fact that we don't live 'in heaven' in the eternal state, but in a new universe, is beside the point. Sometimes people get anal on this topic, saying we shouldn't say "in heaven" because we eventually will return to earth, New Jerusalem, eternal state, etc. — relax, k?]
God doesn't avoid sin or rejection because He must. He just flat doesn't want it. That it would also be destructive, is besides the point. So that same understanding, can be built in us and sustained by the Holy Spirit. So, 2 Corinthians 5:21: God gives us His Righteousness for FREE. We but need vote for it, John 3:16 (belief in Him is a kind of voting). So there is no excuse for rejection. To allege God's Standard is too high, is obviated by Christ paying for all sin; man does aught but believe, to be saved from Hell. So to turn THAT offer down, requires a hatred of God Himself which eclipses even self's own desire for happiness. So the person is hellish inside, already. Of course, even we humans know of such persons in real life. So how much better, does God know the hell of sin, so would never find it attractive?
Post-salvation, the separation is likewise not a work man must or can do — again, of course creation can't live up to the Standard, but creation can choose to VOTE. So, the more you choose to know God, the more Integrity will be poured into you via those Diamond Doctrine Deposits by the Holy Spirit, to 'fill up' the Imputed Divine Righteousness you got at salvation (Rom8:4, Greek). This increases the Togetherness, and the subordination. For the result is an increase in your CAPACITY for love, life, happiness — especially, with God. As a consequence, you will know God better, and the Knowledge Will Change You. All this, in accordance with your volition, never coerced. It's His Power, and He uses it, not you — but it is your choice for Him to do that. He knows how much of that Power 'fits' with your volition at the moment; successive iterations produce successively greater Voluntary Dependence, and hence, Love.
That's why faith, a positive, pro-God decision, becomes Faith, His Truth, Thinking, Poured Into You. Hence that latter faith does all the work, each time with your consent. Heh: that's the real meaning of James 2:22 if anyone could translate the intransitive verb SUNERGEW, properly; but, it's intransitive, so can't be translated, thereby demonstrating the Truth that Doctrine You Believe is the hero. See, Greek drama scripts gave the villain, intransitive verbs; heroes got the transitive verbs, my pastor explained, when exegeting Rom8:28 for us a few years back. But in the Bible, this intransitive verb, is transitively used! Look it up in Wallace. Scholars mistake this for an error, bad Greek (very common MISdiagnosis, i.e., with Peter's writing, anacoluthens, etc). Scholars have no end of trouble figuring out this verb, forgetting what my pastor explained to us about the Greek drama usage, because few in Christian scholarship circles 'buy' the importance of Drama Greek in Scripture, anymore. Whoa — what's being missed!
See, "sun" means essentially "together", in combination, a corporateness. Next, "ergon" is God-deeds, in Greek lit., so the usual translation of "works" or "good deeds" isn't really what the term meant in Drama Greek. Put these two together, and you get together-in-God-deeds, the idea of participation. The term was thus used commonly for any kind of worthwhile enterprise, hence the usual translation in English Bibles, of "fellow worker", "co-worker", even compatriot. The verb is sunergew ("w" is a rounded long "oh", so pronounced soon-err-GEH-oh), but it's intransitive, so a process no human is doing. Again, this cultural value of no-human-doing, is in the Greek, but — see how you can't translate it into English without adding words? And how do you add words to convey the meaning?
So Look, Enjoy, Eat! As 1 Corinthians 3:9 and 2 Corinthians 1:24 explain in context, via the cognate noun sunergoi, GOD does the work, not you; IT converts what cannot be done (intransitive becoming transitive) into agathos, Divine Good (Romans 8:28 uses the verb). So, as 3 John 8 notes, which uses the same noun, we become sunergoi, 'datively' — due to relationship/association with, by means of, in the sphere of.. the Truth! Again, IT produces us: no longer villains, but heroes!
Bible uses this term a lot to designate a believer — hah! Made good on! The one God works together in the Body! So, 'fellow-worker', lol! Of course, the humor of that translation, goes missed by those who think "worker" is Transitive! So they think they are to hustle, do good deeds, when the very term means GOD-DEEDS, Ephesians 2:10's Ionic Dative Donative, turning demon spawn into seed of the Seed! Take that, Ion, you who would be the author of God's people! What a tragedy, to not know how God makes heroes out of us villains. What villainy, that Satan (&Co.) can so reverse the meaning of sunergoi in translation; what a burlesque, that the term cannot be properly translated, no matter how hard one tries! See? We are helpless villains, too...
Heh. You get to 'contribute' the problem, so you will be in conflict internally, as you grow. The hatred we inherit in Adam is being broken apart, then down, then out (running thread in Romans 5~8), and it's a house-to-house battle, in the final stages. So don't make the mistake of thinking it's easy! While it's God going before you like He did for the Israelites (Exo14:13) — "Stand still..the LORD will deliver you today" — your internal struggle over this awesome process will be increasingly intense.
By contrast, the more you choose to not know God, Christian or no, the more you are choosing hatred. Doesn't matter you don't know that fact; doesn't matter you don't mean that fact. There is no middle ground. So either Love or Hatred will 'make' you into its own image. You have no ability of yourself, except to choose between them. Each moment, every day of your life, for however long you are here. So, like Moses says, "Choose Life" — he means the Word, in context (Deuteronomy 4:40, 6:18, 29:9, 30:19, etc., it's a refrain) — "so that you may prosper." Truer words were never spoken. The opposite choice, is to be at war with God. Like, the world is. Because.. we're in a Trial. And now we know the plotlines: do we vote for Satan's Hatred Plan? Or, for God's I-Will-Build-My-Word-Love-In-You Plan?
God's and Satan's Arguments and Plans, Both Play on our 'turf'
Back to the Trial, proper: we are hard-headed, so God's superior Grace Argument 'speaks our language', 'plays on our turf'. Hence Word 'follows' our me-merit thought patterns. Okay, pretend MERIT matters. How is Justice Served if Infinite Merit goes unrequited? Yet what can compensate Infinite Merit juridically, except Like-Infinite Merit?
Hence, a Cross: Infinite-Merit thinking the Holy Spirit TAUGHT Christ, 'couples' with maximum negative-merit thinking. Since Cross Compensates Father, can lesser merit be juridically valid if Cross was required in the first place? Is it not but evil, to reject the One Type Of Compensation, Which Is Effective?
Notice the preciseness of the Justice Issue: it's not about whether God needs anything. It's about what is due Him on a merit basis. As we saw above, God's Motive isn't about merit, but about Rapport, but we puny humans — and Satan, too — just can't 'get' that idea. For, in our good-and-evil minds, it's only about merit, and we absolutely can't fathom any other basis for relationship. Hence, God frames the argument so we can fathom what He means. Because, He Wants Rapport. Rapport is two-way. Obviously all our thoughts are in Omniscience, but that's only One Way, One Person 'sharing', God; Christ made it Two-Way, hence He's the Mediator (Galatians 3:19-20, Hebrews 5-10, especially 7:18-28, 8:6, 10:5, 10:10-17). So Through Christ we can share God's Thoughts, as well. That's the whole point of the spiritual life. Togetherness. Oneness With God, John 17 (especially v.21)!
- So Christ went to the Cross to get Total Rapport; Cross is not about sacrifice, but Rapport (Hebrews 10:5, Psalm 40:5-13, Psalm 139:16-17); Truth poured into His Humanity by the Holy Spirit, did that.
- As a consequence, He was able to stay intact, without sin, such that the rest of the Knowledge could be imputed and judged IN His Body on the Cross.
- Thus, Total Rapport, because Total Sharing. If you understand Omniscience, then you understand that such Sharing could only occur if Christ went to and through the Cross — for the ONE thing which could not be otherwise transmitted, was God's Attitude And Knowledge of sin and Judgement of it. Hence, Hebrews 5:8-9.
- Notice the simultaneity of Sharing being accomplished, and also True Payment of sins, because it's Infinite-Quality Truth (about sins and the judgement due them), going to Infinite-Quality Truth in His Humanity.
- So Like-Merit At Both Ends. His Thoughts in reply to all those horrible javelin-truths (Isaiah's term) were the 'currency'.
- So when Father 'sees' sin, He 'sees' Son's Gorgeous Thought Reply On Cross, and that is "sweet savor" (KJV term) to Father. Hence, Atonement, Propitiation.
- Hence, Reconciliation occurs when we believe in Christ, and Redemption is what the Holy Spirit does as a consequence of Reconciliation (i.e., born again, Romans8 filling-us-up-with-Truth, Heb10:10-17). Now you know what really happened on the Cross.
So now you can see that if relationship is to be based on merit, then no relationship with Infinite merit is do-able. Hence the Justice Requirement (not a Divine need, but our need) for a Cross. For even perfect humanity is short, because finite. Hence, even Christ had to receive the pouring-in of Truth, to BECOME Infinite Merit, aka Divine Righteousness. He could have instead tapped His Own Godness, if merit was the issue. But since merit is not the issue — for even becoming merit requires lagtime between pouring-in and completion — He could Receive the Merit from What the Holy Spirit Did to Him. Which, as we know from Scripture, is what happened (i.e., John's Gospel clause "full of Grace and Truth/Doctrine", "I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life"; Isaiah 53:11's Hebrew, etc). As God, the Son CHOSE to become short, rather than choosing to use His Own Natural Merit: Philippians 2:5-10, 1 Timothy 2:5's Greek.
Look: in an unequal relationship, the inferior one will need to justify why the relationship is not unfair for the superior one. The Cross is sublime Comfort to us that God Was Paid; so we can relax about our inferiority. "Therefore now, NO condemnation to those in Christ Jesus!", Rom8:1. (corr. trans from Greek, but look it up anyway — each Greek word and case has many meaning layers — no verbs in the Greek means Paul is shouting, as it were. "Ouden" in Greek is very strong, conveys no condemnation of any kind, ever. Kinda like the English expression, "no no no no NO!") We Need A Cross to justify the relationship. God really doesn't need anything, nothing 'dents' Him, but it truly wouldn't be fair to have a relationship if He didn't get paid. So, since Christ wanted to add Humanity to Himself to maximally express His Love for Father, and since in His Humanity He wanted Total Sharing which He Himself did not create from Himself, Father can Justify Relationship with us, and we ourselves can justify relationship with Him. The Koran and all other holy books ignore this justice issue; that's conclusive evidence God didn't write them. Satan rejects this Justice Issue, suing for Divorce.
Notice how God explains in 'two languages', the Good News of our weakness and His Love, to OUTFLANK our natural hatred. First, man's natural good-and-evil 'language' of (Satan's) merit: well, on a merit-basis, you'd have to BE infinite merit, to 'merit' relationship with Me. And you'll never reach that level, because even I didn't make Myself. Both Mosaic Law and Cross 'speak' that language. Second, God's REAL 'language': I AM Merit, and I want Rapport, so I POUR Merit into My Son's Humanity to 'merit' (justify) making sons out of menstrual rags. Greater Love, Greater humor! does not exist (i.e., John 17, Romans 5~7, 1 Corinthians 6~7, 12, 2 Corinthians 5, Galatians 3, Hebrews 2, all of Ephesians — trace all sexual/idol wordplay in the original languages for maximum profit).
There's a common i'm-so-humble arrogance voiced much like in Deuteronomy 30: oh, God is too high to know! Oh yeah? As if you knowing Him meant you did it? Gimme a break! This is one of the most arrogant objections man voices, and he voices it all the time. Even valuable secular knowledge in your head never means you are merit, but IT is merit. That It is in your head, blesses you. So how much more, knowledge of God which only He can transmit, which passages like Isaiah 53~55 tell you He wants to transmit? So how arrogant do you have to be, to claim you did something, if you got it? Unbelievable! See how unfixable our sin natures, are? For God to call them "menstrual rags" in Isaiah 64:6, is too kind!
We think like this all the time — if we got good looks, somehow we are the author of them; if we got smarts, somehow we are the author of them. If we own this or that 'status' thing or person, somehow we are the author. And on and on and on, even down to whether we use a 'better' hair gel! Even love is used as a status symbol to prove self good! When people read or say, "you should love, brother" — the mindset underneath the words is, you are bad if you don't do this, as if the only value of loving, was to make self, good! See? Whatever we do, we arrogate to ourselves the credit; never mind, that whatever we get, we didn't really create (looks, smarts, achievements). Think hard: every NASCAR race or ballgame has a winner, but it isn't always the same winner. Something always goes wrong. So even the winning via hard work is not meritorious. Pleasant, blessing, yes; owed, no.
But we ignore the reality of our helpless state, because we can't stand it. Hatred hates. Love loves. Adam immediately became ashamed, afraid, crazy, hating (blaming) due to the Fall: analyze Genesis 3, even in translation. So like him, we fantasize every good thing as 'owed' us. To calm ego. Because, we hate; so, we hate our weakness. God, by contrast, Loves (Romans 5:6-11, 1 John's "God is Love"). So when someone 'wicked' gets what we consider good things, we are soooo miffed! Why should the wicked prosper, we whine. We ache to see the rich brought low, because if WE are not rich but they are, WE are not being rewarded, and we hate them getting what we do not! How unfair! Never recognizing, hey — it's utter arrogance to call blessing, Something Owed! But hatred only thinks in terms of owed. Love, by contrast, only thinks in terms of Grace, and Loves doing so. Because hatred, hates; love, loves. It's that simple. Tell me: if you really love doing something, don't you spend your time loving it, rather than patting yourself on the back? By contrast, if you hate doing something, aren't there thoughts of Wanting To Be Compensated? Prosecution rests, baby.
Yikes! Do you see Satan's make-myself-high attitude, now? Do you see why religion and fake holy books so hook the human race? They are all based on hatred! The Romans 7 shellgame! 'Good' only makes us miserable! Oh, Who will deliver us from these bodies of crazy, dead thinking?! Thanks be to God, through Our Lord Jesus Christ!
Now you can hopefully begin to see the awesomeness of His Pouring Truth into us. We who are menstrual rags, can Actually Think As Christ Did? Is there a bigger miracle than this? And what's the Efficacy and Blessing of that to the human race? Well, look what His Thinking did on the Cross! We can do that Same Thinking? The Same Person Who Poured Truth into Him, does it to us. Whoa. Never mind hatred, then, we get God's Own Thinking! Outflanked hatred then, our puny nature is no barrier, Romans 8:1!
So, the Cross having been completed, its Harvest being we can Get His Own Thinking — what other 'produce', competes? Oh, TARES imposing many a TARIFF of self-merit doo-doo! Aka, "good": good deeds, morality, "being good"! A "tare" is olde English for a weed which looks like wheat and grows up with it. Spoils the harvest. Aka, Good-And-Evil. Christ hung on a Tree, so only one other tree remains: "the Knowledge of Good and Evil", just as in the Garden. We are back in the Garden, due to the Cross — because Sin Is Not The Issue, due to the Cross being successfully completed. Funny how obvious, that the Prohibited Knowledge Was Of Good-And-Evil. Good is evil, evil is good, both are anti-God. That's why a GOOD DEED is the first thing that Adam does, after his Fall. For Satan denounces Adam's nakedness and Adam 'atones' by doing a good deed — fig leaves. Which the Lord Himself humorously notes, in the Hebrew of Genesis 3:11. Adam, you did a good deed? You were naked before you sinned, don't you remember? It wasn't shameful, then (Genesis 2:25).. so the verse reads in corrected (caps) translation, "WHO DENOUNCED you for being naked?" (Genesis 3:11a.) [Every Bible translation I've ever seen mistranslates this clause (mainly mistranslating Heb verb nagadth) as "Who told you that you were naked", thereby DENOUNCING God as a withholder of knowledge, just like Satan DENOUNCED God in Genesis 3:4-5. Why didn't any translation committee catch on to the problem of translating 3:11a so evilly, when 2:25, and 3:4-5, are so nearby? See how Satan messes with us, playing his clever jokes on us hapless Christians, using us to denounce our own Savior?! My pastor taught this translation error from 1975 forward, so it's not as though no one had a clue about the Hebrew. Worse, I could tell even from BibleWorks' lexicons that the verse was mistranslated. Those lexicons are mostly very old. Are we vile to so malign God when we 'translate' Him, or what?]
That good-and-evil are ONE, Bible's Greek indicates in many ways. Most technically (legal precision!), by usage/omission of the article (nee: definite article, "the"), all linked by "kai" (usually lamely translated "and"). For example, we know Trinity are Three Separate Gods, Each Co-Equal, by usage of the article in 2 Corinthians 13:14: the three articles signify Three Separate Gods of Identical, Infinite Nature. So, unity is indicated by the reverse: one article for two+ nouns, or no articles for any nouns, all (again) linked by "kai". This latter is in Genesis 3:5. There, good-and-evil is a hendiadys, meaning a unity is depicted: a hydra-headed monster named "good-and-evil". One 'head' of the same monster is "good", and the other 'head' is named "evil", on the same Scylla. (Bible's metaphorical depiction of religio-political multi-headed monsters has same import, generically. God makes analogy between the systems of good-and-evil with their satanic origin, thus.)
So we see immediately that God doesn't like "good", it's evil. (My pastor notes in his 1975 Genesis exegesis tapes on Genesis 3, that evil is the thinking, good is the action due to the evil thinking.) So look closely at how Bible uses verses with the word "good" or "works" in them, noting that each verse tweaks man's puny ideas of both terms: for, only God is Good (Luke 18:19, Mark 10:18). [Always look for satirical/ironical meanings in Bible, for every verse is loaded with them. Much of what God says escapes reader attention, because folks read the Bible as if in a fog. You don't read great secular literature in a fog, so don't read Bible that way, either. Granted, you won't well understand Bible without breathing 1 John 1:9 as you read it, but even puny human intelligence can read without being in a fog!]
"Good" always is sold as something you do, not something you are. Something you have, not something you are. Then, insanely, if you Do the doo, or have the halve, suddenly, presto! You are good! Whaaaa???? Do you detect a little shellgame going on here? How can you become what you were not by means of something outside yourself, yet you are the maker? Sounds like "I will make myself like the Most High" (Isaiah 14:13-14), right?
Right. The whole 'do' thing is sheer insanity. Clothing. Kinda like tariffs. Like "good", tariffs raise the cost of things in the name of protecting native industry. So, in the US, Brazilian oranges have a tariff on them, so US oranges are the same or lower 'price' in the supermarket. This, to allegedly protect the US orange industry. (Tariffs=same idea as price supports or the minimum wage, but with respect to foreign competing goods of the same type.)
So, right there, you see tariffs have an ego-buttressing purpose. The country raising a tariff is not as good at making a given item, as some country outside it. So a tariff, kinda like the "affirmative action" program, is an admission of inferiority. Whether the native product is truly inferior or not, it is thus claimed inferior, because the protection is created! Which, of course, sends exactly the wrong message. The alleged protection is claimed to nurture native industry, and always there's this stated goal of one day removing the tariff, when the native industry is competitive. That's how "good" works, too: you have to shield your ego from others' "good", to assure yourself that you are good, yet the very shielding betrays that you are not good. So, you are threatened: you have to put down what others do, to protect yourself. This is how mental illness, begins.
For here's the problem: once you set one tariff, you have to create more. Joao Goulart in Brazil (1960's, if I remember) had no end of trouble with tariffs. Nearly killed Brazil's private sector (see Celso Furtado or Thomas Skidmore's or J. Winpenny's works on the topic). Like do's, tariffs are supposed to 'protect' something from competition, but the protection stultifies progress. The 'protected' items being thus inferior (else why the protection), those protected don't try to make a better product. So, more tariffs need to be imposed. Worse, the industries not protected by tariffs, begin to clamor for tariffs also. So, the buyers veer away from the native product (this happened to US cars in the 1970's), until the whole group of 'protected' industries, collapse. Again, this is what nearly happened, in Brazil. Same kind of problem, as monopolies.
"Good" always but always imposes ego tariffs, thus arresting spiritual growth. The buyers eventually seek other vendors. This is why Catholicism collapsed, and now the independent churches, who are generally following the same path as in 200AD et seq., are about to replicate the rise (and thus fall) of Catholicism. Do's done which ego uses to call self good eventually stultify the doer. So he has to increase his claimed value vis á vis others' good deeds, to keep his ego happy. Thus, he gets himself into a position of never improving, lest he admit his inferiority. Again, this is how mental illness begins. This is why religion becomes dogmatic. This is the story of the Jews' descent into Pharisaism, and Christianity's descent into legalism.
So now look: the Christian right fantasize they 'protect' marriage, if they pass a US federal amendment to ban gay marriage. Oh, then Christian marriage, must be in trouble! What, God isn't enough protection, we have more faith in Caesar? Yeah, then Christian marriage really IS in trouble, if it has to go down to Egypt for help (Isaiah 30:1-17; 31;1-3). Ok, so say Caesar's law banning gay marriage is passed (fat chance: it's unconstitutional). Then what do you do? For if gays marrying threatens heterosexuals, everything threatens them.
The whole movement is really disingenuous, and the Christians pimping it make our God appear as petty as they are. The real issue is that gays claim health benefits and other benefits due to marriage, so when states which ban gay marriage refuse to grant those benefits, the case goes on appeal. So it has to do with money, not marriage. Well, States Have Rights To Pass Marriage Laws — US Supreme Court will easily uphold that, given enough cases and time. So we don't need a Federal Amendment to protect anything. But to have the colossal effrontery to claim protection of the "sanctity" of marriage via this unconstitutional Amendment — uh, isn't it God Who Sanctifies? Did Christ save you, or did Caesar? Honestly! Whatever happened to Philippians 1:20, 1 Peter 3:15, 1 John 2:28? They're still in the Bible, but not in any of these folks' minds?
So what next tariff do you levy against entry into His Kingdom (see Matthew 23:13ff)? Do you ban gaily-decorated clothing, next? That's a greater threat, see — because some roving eye, might catch on it! Oh, then what about Gaily-decorated packaging? Shall we all go back to the Puritans, who only allowed black-and-white, and if your white collar was a tad wider than your neighbor's, you were 'racy'? Remember Nathaniel Hawthorne's, The Scarlet Letter? See Psalm 50:16-22, Romans 2. Good God prescribes is to be used Under His Grace. Absent grace, good IS evil, Satan's thinking. So if not breathing 1 John 1:9 and learning Scripture under your right pastor, all you do is wrong, defiled: Bible keyword is adikia (in 1 John 1:9), an Old Testament keyword for an unclean Temple (John's Greek is very precise). Law and grace are mutually incompatible (Romans 6:14, Galatians 3:18 and other verses with "grace" and "law" in them).
Freedom requires competition. Wheat and tares growing up together. The wheat is still wheat. Both are grown by GOD, not tariffs. So: maybe it would be better to let heterosexual marriage 'compete' freely with gay marriage, so people won't mistake the prohibition as a hidden 'fun'. Remember America's Prohibition era? That worked as well as Brazil's tariffs! If you carefully comb Scripture, you'll find that drugs and prostitution, while proscribed under the Law, flourished. (Remember Tamar and Judah? From whom Christ descended?) Hint, hint...
It's noteworthy that for the longest time, the Catholic Church sought to "protect" who got access to, and access to translate, Scripture. Lots of persecution against those who didn't kowtow to the Holy See. Moreover, what folks could get Bibles, only got portions of them, or got them written in unreadable script of an outdated Latin: Jerome was furious about that, so they cooled his contemporary translation for 400 years! Not that Catholicism should be blamed: any Christian denomination would have done the same, had "it" been in power. Proof positive: we've had the original languages of Scripture available now to anyone for between 50-150 years, yet 'independent' as well as denominational Christian churches generally still teach the age-old Catholic lie that soul life is in the womb? No excuse! So: now the "protection" is just as bad, as it has always been. Even God's Own Inspired Word is a threat to tariffed trafficking! So it should be no surprise that the doctrinal trends of these groups parallel the devolution into Catholicism which began in earnest during the reign of Commodus (180AD). Total dejá vue. Total Ezekiel 34!
Reverse illustration: say you are smart, pretty, rich. So, you do a lot with that gift. So folks admire you for that gift. Ok: what happens when 'tomorrow', you lose that gift (Luke 12)? Are you suddenly trailer trash? What about those who never had that gift? Should God throw them away? See how crazy? Why do we assign value to ourselves based on dead things? A talent or appearance is still just as dead, as its lack is dead. A pretty, dead blonde, is still a pretty dead blonde! Our sin nature in Adam is terminally insecure, like Satan is. So it is instinctive to grab on anything called 'good' in order to buttress ego. That's why you have all those Bible verses warning about the sudden destruction of evil (i.e., Isa47:3ff). Because, evil is tariff in nature. Like, the sin nature. Always tinkering, never achieving anything stable, always building on the sand of time.
By contrast, James 1 humourously notes that the rich man can exult in his poverty, and the poor man in his wealth — because neither matter. Doctrine is wealth (main theme of James 1~2). So, both can ignore the transient 'good', which is no more than a layering, trapping, system of tariffs. Poverty traps the poor man, due to his many lacks; but wealth traps the rich man, due to his many haves. Who doesn't have too much to do in a day? That's what wealth is. Who doesn't have too little time in a day? That's what poverty is. Tariffs all, binding you, tyrannizing you, exhausting you. But Doctrine is FREE: Isaiah 55.
Note the paradox: God gave you whatever you have. Exult in that. If you are rich, exult in your riches, to Celebrate What God Gave You. As He said to Satan, "I put you there" (Eze28:14, said to Satan, but true for anyone, wherever). God put you where you are. Don't deprecate what He gave you, by eyes-half-mast, or by arrogating to yourself credit. Exult, rather, in the fact that it's a Blessing, whatever it is, and a Free Gift to you. Rest assured, God is using whatever HE gave you to glorify His Word. You don't have to 'do' anything, for this to happen. Seeing that fact, is glory to you, and glory in your seeing that fact, is critical in the Trial. Whether hardship or ease, adversity or prosperity, ALL is a gift. So long as you see that fact, all you have or lack, will be a glory to you. So long as you don't see that fact, all you have or lack, will be a misery to you. For, Satan is the most beautiful creature to come from the 'Hand' of God, yet all he has, is miserably arrogated to his own credit (Ezekiel 28:18, in context). So he is never free. Don't emulate his self-tyranny, for your own sake.
"It is for freedom that Christ has set you free." Galatians 5:1, John 8:32. Those aren't just some nice words to quote at a commencement exercise or funeral. Truth has no value apart from Love, which is why you see verses like Psalm 138:2b and 89:14-15, showing God values Truth above His Own Person. He loves it. It's that beautiful, but note the need of Love. No matter how competent you are, life is miserable without love. So, people fantasize love all the time, which is why we arrogate 'good' in dead things to ourselves. We're trying to get love!
Yet God gives it for free, and we snub our noses at His Word, in favor of those sandy works. Ok: so now you are soooo goood! And sooooo alone! For, who can stand to be near you, as good as you are? People can't stand God, though He's Perfect — they want His Goodies, but not Him. So, do you think they will like you, Ms./Mr. Oh-So-Competent.. either? Guess again! Love can only be 'for free'; no amount of talent/ goodies/ competence can buy it. So God freely Gave His Own Son, Who is "The Way, the Truth, and the Life." Which Gift, makes us totally meritorious (Romans 5:5-21, 2 Corinthians 5:14-21). Yet, whether we love Him or not, is our free choice. No tariffs.
For, you'll notice that all those admonishments in Bible, require your volition. You want to, or not. All the nagging in the world won't make you love God. You do, or do not. So no bolt of lightning will come down on you if you reject Him. Frankly, that's what you should fear, the fact that you can 'get away with it' — He doesn't coerce. Hence the admonishments. For, the person who rejects God turns himself into his own satan. Ever bitter, ever idolizing himself. No room for God, then. Lightning would be nicer! But God has no room for tariffs. So free competition in spiritual growth is God's Standard: 1 Corinthians 3. So if you want credit from God, beware of "good". No good deed will go unpunished (see also Revelation 20:11-15, where the unbeliever's works are likewise the basis of indictment, Christ's FREE WORK having been refused).
'Good' is so bad, after the Fall God had to step in and create loyalty barriers to protect humans from it: working to eat, childbearing and rearing (hence family, marriage being a pre-Fall institution); and at length, nations. Civil rule has always been separate from God's Rule (which is why the Ziggurat of Babel was judged); even, during the Theocracy period of Israel. Nor did the Lord change that standard when He was here: Scripture stresses this fact by repeating it in three Gospels (see Matthew 22:21, 12:17, Luke 20:25; see also Romans 13, and in LXX search on the distinction between entole, dikaiomata, and krimata in the Mosaic Law).
So there is not now, nor was there ever, nor will there ever be, a "Christian" nation; but rather the Revelation 17 harlot, pretending legitimacy (another version of Babel, hence she's called "Babylon"). Again, Christendom can't read its Bible, when it misreads even US history, pretending on television that we were founded as a Christian nation. The "founding Fathers" were largely Deists, not Christians; and the Real Deity never required such a nation, even when as God He ruled ISRAEL. The FUTURE promise was that Israel would BECOME a priest nation, if they obeyed the Law. They didn't. They had GOD as their King. They rejected Him in favor of being "like other nations", thereby abrogatint the future promise. So it was given to David, 2 Samuel 7 (see Chapters 7~11 of 1 Samuel, for context). So never on earth has the Kingdom of God, actually been realized. It will be. But not now. So no "Christian nation" will ever exist this side of the Millennium.
Even back before Israel rejected God as their King, there was separation of church and state. Read Leviticus through Numbers, sometime. Always you see the distinction made between civil and spiritual; further, unbelievers didn't have to participate in the spiritual ceremonies. Nor did unbelievers PAY for any of the spiritual items. "Tithes", for example, were a flat national, civil, INCOME TAX (percentage), part of krimata (Judgements); but "offerings" came under dikaiomata (Ordinances), as spiritual gifts, and were wholly voluntary: hence Leviticus designates tiers of gifts so the poor wouldn't be unable to give (one could give flour/oil, a bird, etc., in lieu of an lamb). [When I heard a supposed pension expert mangle the difference between a Trustee and a Custodian, I realized how it is so many pastors can mangle the difference between "tithes" and "offerings". It's a problem of two 'hats'. A Trustee can, but need not, be also Custodian; the Temple priests were also civil servants, because the Temple was also a FORTRESS, so was the safest place to store goods. Two hats, two separate functions. Rightly dividing the Word of Truth (Hebrews 4:12), solves the problem. Of course, that means study under the Spirit (1 John 1:9 breathed), not tariffs.]
All God's Laws have a two-fold purpose: a) Trial language of accommodation, Merit is not an issue, and if it were, you can't be as good as Me; and b) "good" is evil. So ever since Genesis 3:15, which the Mosaic Law elaborated fully — all God's Laws demonstrate against "good". Man's sin nature is totally wacko (just look at Genesis 3), so man can't discern the difference between real good, and Satan's counterfeit. Hence, the Mosaic Law was all about barriers, to restrain man's good-and-evil mindset. If you take a close look at the laws, every prohibition protects man from harm if he obeys it: viz., the famous Lev19:18 proscription against taking revenge. So it's real good to obey, a true blessing/protection. Not, something to crow over, get it?
The Law was mainly to evangelise, teach what Messiah-to-Come, would do. Do's were done as mnemonics, and if you carefully go through Bible looking at Psalms and the prophets, you'll see those mnemonics worked quite well, for there are constant analogies made to the Law's prescriptions and proscriptions, to Build Thought. Specialized vocabulary runs rife in Hebrew, and frankly there's not one Hebrew word which doesn't have some 'tie' to a Law provision. So through learning the etymology of the words, you learn much about how very well, the Law was taught and known.
So too, since only Messiah's Coming would solve anything, man was given basic laws he could use to get a happy down-here life, while he waited. The entole was first, a kind of how-do-I-think personal guidebook, from which all the rest of the Law, 'branched': we know the entole, as "The 10 Commandments", but with all their corollaries, it's much more than 10. The krimata, were the laws for having a nation, being a nation. Since you lived a dual life toward God and people, there were lots of spiritual applications which you could make from the secular laws, and these were listed and taught as well. For example, the dietary laws were secular, not spiritual, to keep the people healthy (Judaism at least remembers that even today); but the spiritual applications were many, and optional. Paul explains all this in Romans and Corinthians; Peter's dream in Acts is another example. Unclean versus clean depicted unhelpful versus helpful, spiritually. Just as not all food was right to eat, not all actions were right to do; not all thoughts were right to do. Again, Judaism 'got' that message, and preserved it in the Talmud. Mishnah portion is pretty easy to read, if you're interested (just remember you are always in the middle of a Torah discussion, and the jumpiness won't bother you).
So the upshot from the Law, was this: you can't fix what's wrong, Messiah Alone does. So Hear The Word, Think the Word, Wear the Word 24/7. For the Word works. And then secularly, follow the entole and krimata, to be happy down here. Sage advice.
See the paradox? Good is so bad, even Perfect God says it can't be fixed: only, restrained. Hence, a Cross — which, if you think it over, was a lacerating that began, and ended, the sin never actually changing — because, all you can do with bad, is PAY for it. It itself, never gets fixed. The believer is ransomed, but until he dies his good-and-evil sin nature is not removed. And even then, it is removed, never fixed. (See 1 Corinthians 15, especially v.36ff.) So, of course even the Mosaic Law, which came from God, doesn't fix anything; Paul frequently reminds the reader of this, like in Romans 4, 9, 11, Galatians; writer of Hebrews explains how Messiah did what the Law could never do, save you, with climactic chapters like Hebrews 3, 4, 9 and 10, demonstrating the "weakness" of the Law. For, the Law says that sin is a terminal disease which can only be treated, never cured: tying back to Genesis 2:17's mot-tamut: dying spiritually we die physically, and even when born again, the body isn't fixed. Paul remarks in Romans 1~3 and 7, how the sin nature is soooo bad, when it gets a law, all it can do with that law is distort and disobey it. Everything we touch turns to doo-doo: even and especially, True Good From God.
No wonder Adam had to leave the Garden: a sick mindset can't exactly enjoy a well status quo. Before he sinned, being naked was okay; after he sinned, he was upset about it, though still in the same place. Hopeless!
Notice how good becomes no good when there is no longer compatible thinking. Adam HAD had rapport with the Lord, pre-Fall. But the day he sins, bam! Adam goes running to hide IN the Tree. Not eating from it, not enjoying what God gave him. Rather, he hides. No rapport! "My ways are not your ways.." (Isaiah 55) is the problem, not sin. Sin causes good-and-evil thinking to replace God's Thinking. So no amount of good environment, helps. The mindset remains afraid and blaming, just like Adam and the woman were, in Genesis 3. Before, everything was fine. After, everything around the couple was the same; but the couple now manifest every psychological defense mechanism known. So, are afraid; so, hide; so, accuse each other and God Himself, when queried by Him. Self-tyranny, this good-and-evil knowledge. Hopeless!
So what God does, as explained in the #1-#7 links in LordvSatan2.htm, are SEVEN THINGS to BARRIER this good-and-evil mindset, to give man independence.
- The first is FREE SALVATION. No works. Genesis 15:6 and John 3:16. What GOD does, nothing man does. This protects man against the tyranny of works and religion, which Satan authors.
- Next, is FREE PROCREATION, soul not imputed UNTIL BIRTH, same pattern as Genesis 2:7. The procreative act and pregnancy itself, are both characterized by effort, and biological deadness — for only God creates the soul freely, and at birth. This protects freedom of the eventual child from being FORCED by its mother while still in a womb, not to mention all the pain spared (if no soul, then no consciousness, then no pain of the developing body parts).
- Next, is FAMILY, a loyalty counter to ideas about 'good' which are outside and around the family unit. This protects the soul from being influenced by non-family, and also family's limited size, restricts the influence of family on the soul.
- Next, is NATIONS, so that people are free to vote with their feet for a lower level of evil. Nations tend to fall when they get too big.
- Next, is a GOD-MADE RACE VIA FAITH, so people can see that works don't represent God's idea of 'good' — but rather, Faith is good. This protects one from racism, culturalism, all the 'isms that races and nations tend to get into. Again, it's a protection against works.
- Next, a GOD-MADE NATION, so people can see what good law should do. This helps competition among nations to engender better laws, and helps defeat the inevitable evil of tribalism — for law rules over family lines.
- Finally, a GOD-Made SAVIOR, so people can Eternally Vote. This protects the soul from being too preoccupied with this world. For you know you will DIE. The Kingdom of Heaven is IN Heaven, not on earth. When Christ returns, it will be on earth. He came the first time at the originally-schedule END of Time, to inaugurate that Kingdom, which required VOTING. Israel voted against Him. Thus Church had to be inserted, so that Time could continue and the Kingdom promised, could nonetheless be realized. Love never coerces. Knowing this helps the soul orient to Eternity, so life down here is less important, and one is thus freer to live down here.
Such barriers are always needed, because good always devolves into tyranny. So Bible explains the Law is good, but even it can't save (i.e., Romans 7, Galatians). Obeying it can only restrain the sin nature, thus preserving the human race; can only alert man to the need of a Savior (see Galatians, Romans 4~7, Ephesians 2, Hebrews 4,5-7,8-10). Of course, if you twist the Law to remove restraint, you get tyranny, faster.
The meanwhile, all these God-designed barriers have the effect of making the variant ideas of 'good', compete. Which thus frees the mind to consider their relative merits. Since man is chained to a merit-me mindset, God creates more chains so that chained man is freed to think, even though still chained. So, in sum, the barriers constantly beg the question of one 'good' versus another. Good to give to charity, but if you cheat your family thereby, not good. So one has to struggle between competing 'goods', and thus learn Grace. For, the goods competing are bewildering, and no matter what you choose, the choice ends up being bad in some way. So who will deliver us from all this competition? That's when one is motivated to LOOK UP...
Satan's whole policy is about removing these seven restraints, and he uses "good" to do it. Satan's goal is to herd man away from competing loyalties and into a 'mass' idea of Self-is-God. Especially, by allegiance to some 'mass' idea, like a race, a people, a nation, a RELIGION. That's what Tower of Babel meant. That's what the Revelation 17 harlot, means. That's what the push to world government and bigger government, means. And to do this, he must focus on what man considers bad, to motivate man to break down his natural barriers, in the name of the 'higher good'. So, Satan sponsors what we consider bad: crime, lasciviousness, etc. If he can make it rampant enough, then man will demand from government rather than God, protection; will cede to government rather than God, his personal and family freedoms and needs, in the name of protection. So down the road of tyranny, man goes. All in the name of good, the barriers man needs for his freedom, come tumbling down.
- Government and Faith are supposed to be separate, under the Mosaic Law. By crusading on abortion, gay marriage and other religious issues, this separation is being destroyed. Christians are in for Big Divine Discipline from God, and the nation has been suffering a lot in the Bible belts. Wakeup call.
- Government and business are supposed to be separate, too. Not one law in the Law regulated business, but did promise judgement from GOD — God, not government — if business misused its freedom.
- Per the Mosaic Law, Government has no rights over your individual privacy. So can't regulate your marrying, your family, your associations with non-criminals, your birthing, your thinking, your speech, etc. You had civil cases to handle disputes among people; else, GOD was in charge, not the civil authorities.
- Per the Mosaic Law, faith issues were private and voluntary; not only did the Government have no rights to regulate faith, but the Government had a duty to allow free exercise of whatever faith you had, so long as you didn't endanger others. Solomon, for example, allowed all the Canaanite cults in his reign, and was faulted by God for that, but God didn't order Solomon to get rid of those religions, but only of his sponsorship (i.e., 1 Kings 3:3, with detail in 1 Kings 11). For the King is the Exemplar of the People. Not legislation, but Example. Because faith is to be free. Sheesh: the entire founding of the Nation Israel was to give the world a place they could freely choose to go in order to be with the Real God. Even Pharaoh was given an option, not zapped into obedience. Do we learn nothing from the Bible? Apparently.
The time-honored method of rising to power is to tap man's JEALOUSY against the rich. Look: any money you'll ever spend, buys someone else food on the table. Doesn't matter how you spend it. Someone made whatever product you purchase, and someone's kids went to school or ate food that night partly because you bought the item. So a rich man's many things, were all made by someone: who thus is eating dinner tonight, paying the mortgage, saving for college — all because the rich guy bought them, same as you. But the demagogue knows how to use JEALOUSY over that rich guy's finer things. So the demagogue riles JEALOUSY against the rich for having better and more, thus STEALING his money by OUR votes. So we just ROBBED hard-working people of college educations, food on the table, due to our JEALOUSY, and instead gave money we didn't own, to a THIEF. Liberalism is thievery, so it plays to jealousy in any country where it spreads its satanic disease. That's why it's popular, whether riled up by the Graccus Brothers in ancient Rome, or the 'brothers' in one's local political race: people are JEALOUS of what 'the other guy' has. So they don't think. They emote. And are suckers for it, taxed until death.
Hitler rose to power on these very moral grounds. Before him, Lenin rose to power on the same moral grounds. Mao Tse Tung rose to power on exactly the same moral grounds. We see someone 'better' not behaving, and we get all ticked off. Then we destroy all that wealth (i.e., buildings and stores at Krystalnacht, churches and palaces during the Russian Revolution, every kind of object during Mao). So that wealth didn't get sold to help the poor, did it? So who's the immoral one? The Jealous Person. In the bargain, "authority" is trashed, too. So notice how the restraints are broken down.. by JEALOUSY.
It's a common and continuing trend of modern representative government, that demagogues can marshal the pettiness in man, the jealousy and greed in man, against some other group — and by declaiming against them, rise to power. Thus all authority structures erode or even crumble. So we know from the 20th century that our "democratic" way of governing, is just as bad and often worse, than all those allegedly-nasty monarchies had been. French Revolution taught us that, but we've not learned, yet. For whenever mob rules, then the rule dies, anarchy reigns, and so a tyrant rises. Happened in ancient Athens, happens now.
It's pretty easy to see all that happening now, in my beloved America. It's really hard for this lifelong Republican to write what follows, but forget politics per se. There's a satanic pattern of encroachment unfolding, and it cares nothing about who it uses to achieve its ends; the humans are but patsies, anyway. So note instead, the eerie unanimity in a nation which has traditionally loved free speech. Same thing happened in Germany, pre-war. Kinda like a calm before a storm, actually. You've probably noticed it. I can't think of anyone I know who hasn't commented on it: I don't feel comfortable speaking my mind these last few years. Sound familiar? We can't attribute this to our government, since obviously the government can't read our minds, k? So what is the disquiet? Where is it coming from?
Although the Government is spot on about Iraq (brilliant, utterly brilliant foreign policy and freedom for people who really needed it, the Iraqis), everywhere else you turn in the US during the last six years, classical Americanism, which really is Republicanism, has been reversing: devolving. Worse, the issues which should be consuming national debate are not debated. Instead, we focus on issues totally outside the Federal jurisdiction: some, not even within a township's review, let alone a whole nation. When a State of the Union speech can talk about stem cells and steroids and Federal Marriage Amendments, and the 'opposition' and press don't vociferously note the inappropriateness of such topics at the Federal level, the entire nation's not thinking.
Instead, the issues are debated as if valid topics for Federal involvement. That's what's scary: agreement. More than mere 'bureaucratic creep', in which a bureaucracy's jurisdiction salami's its way into greater power, to voice such issues as properly Federal lays the groundwork for a vast usurpation of power, later. This tactic is by no means new, but to validate discussion on these topics, is beyond the pale. When have you ever heard such a thing in our country? Medical and business R&D, and maybe the FDA, should perhaps themselves work out whatever problems there are in stemcells and steroids; states alone have the right to decide their marriage rules, ever since Jefferson. Yet no one much notices or speaks up?
Notice how Satan's breaking down the barriers using Christians (his favored 'agent', post-Cross):
See? God's barriers are being broken down in God's Name! And why? Because each of these issues comes under the rubric of "good". A whole bunch of folks find homosexuality offensive, so don't separate the issue of the constitutionality, from who is the 'target'. Clever tactic, that. Hitler got elected in much that way. Pick targets no one much likes, piggyback onto them serious erosions of freedoms, and presto! The nation wakes up one day in bondage of the best kind: tongue-tied. Hitler picked the Communists, the anarchists, and other undesirables. Then, the Jews. Then, the Catholics. By then, anyone who looked askance was a potential knock-in-the-night. Exact same pattern occurred under Caligula, Nero, Lenin, Mao, and of course was the norm in the 'banana republics' of yesteryear. Though of course the current American Administration (2004) doesn't have that agenda, a precedence is being set for a future one. With such stupidity about what is and is not "good", freedoms can be whittled away, despite our vaunted two-party system: for the Democrats, who historically rise to power by flunking common sense and appealing to jealousy, are always useless. So if the Republican party also tanks under the weight of the oxymoronic "Christian right", America tanks.
We have already lost, much. Gone are the days when welfare was a state-controlled concept: The Great Society wrecked that. Gone are the days when business could operate in a true free-enterprise climate; the 'sale' of business-is-bad wrecked that. Now it's fashionable to pick on whoever is in the limelight: even if only over a $50,000 transaction that might have been wrong in some vague way (Martha Stewart). Jealousy means, hunger for a victim. All in the name of "good", of course!
For Satan knows that by removing God's Barriers, he hastens mankind's destruction. For Bible has always said 'from the beginning', that man isn't evolving, but DEVOLVING, due to the Fall (Genesis 2:17's spiritual-death-causes-physical-death, writ large). The more he DEvolves, the more he credits himself as 'progressing'. Basically, the longer man continues, the more negative to God he becomes, en masse. That's partly why Bible spends time saying how long people lived, the idea being that the distance from the Garden will result in an increasing decline in lifespan. So, Adam lived 900 years, but the Apostle John died maybe circa age 100. Good-and-evil speed devolution faster than sin can. Good and evil degrade the soul, because they are substitute MORAL values (sin is merely a break, so can be healed). Just as cancer gradually degrades the body; just as initially, Adam's sin set in motion the body's degradation, so too good-and-evil 'beget' an ever-stronger perpetuation urge, in the biological makeup. It's like exercise: the more you do a given movement, the easier it is to do the same movement the next time, and the harder it is to counter that same movement, after much repetition. Only on the grand scale can you say that mankind's biology will progressively weaken to a point: beyond that point, it's no longer fair to impute a soul at birth. An individual has volition, and while he lives, he can say "no" to anything.
Adam's sin was a Rebellion Of Substitute Morality. Satan accused God of being unfair to withhold knowledge. The woman wanted to rebel anyway, so bought that. Adam is then faced with choosing God or the woman. In order to take the fruit from her hand, he has to make God 'bad' and her good. So he's thinking God wrong and evil, to justify his decision. That's why he accuses God more than she does, when legally interrogated by God the Son, in Genesis 3. Neither of them admit they sinned, until accusing someone else. All in the name of someone else, being wrong. That's a MORAL argument. Morality is forever pointing-the-finger. Hence religion with all its entrapments; hence the rationalizations people use to justify their tribe or nation over another, for the sake of Warring. Notice how a good thing, loyalty to one's people or nation — becomes an evil thing. That's Satan's genius, using what's designed for freedom, to produce tyranny. But he can only do it, by herding the desire to vaunt the self. En masse.
We all know that man loses his inner stability when he rebels against authority; illicit sex first degrades the stability of loyalty to one person of the opposite sex; drugs and crime destabilize the ability to work and enjoy the fruits of it; but religion degrades everything, replaces everything. For religion substitutes "God" with its own false ideas (which worship man, same tactic as Genesis 3, make-self-good-as-God). Since we were DESIGNED by God to love Him FIRST (as in, First Commandment), this deft replacement of a FAKE 'god', completely takes over the soul. Whether the religion is lascivious or ascetic, it's sheer fornication and criminal of intent (taking something away from someone else). So has all the same effects, as would criminality, drugs, illicit sex. But the person in it, justifies himself, main subthread in 1 John. Satan knows this very well. He used the same Genesis 3 tactic on Israel, and as a result, History almost ended. But for Christ committing Himself to a yet-future-Body of believers which He dubbed "Church", we'd all not be here.
The mass devolution since Adam should have ended time: history should have ended 1144AD, on the original Divine Timetable. It went like this: David's death was 963BC per 1 Kings 6:1, and 1000 years after that, Messiah had to finish, Daniel 9:26 (when you do the math). 57 years following that, the new 1050 unit of Civilization Time would begin, and it was to be the Millennium. The last 57 years were to be the Tribulation (Passover Week's 'repayment'), and then the typical 50-year voting period for the Gentiles (which Pentecost and Jubilee depicted). So 1094 would have been the End of the Millennium, followed by another 50-year final (Revelation 20:7) voting period.
Um, we're way past 1144AD: so we're in overtime, due to the calling out of the Church, which has no prophesied end date, but rather only an end-event, the so-called 'Rapture'. [Hence the 'Rapture' is undateable: search "1144AD" in Mirroring.htm, if you're curious about its derivation. Shorter piece on this is TenWaysThisTimelineDiffers.doc. So there's no telling how long life should last, now. The standard actuarial tables kill man off at about age 100, but you can swing 20 years either side, and still be considered "reasonable" in an IRS pension audit. Yet ancient Indian and Dark Ages life expectancies were roughly age 30 or 40, tops. Seems that the more anti-God the group of people, the shorter the lifespan; dunno why, and dunno over how many generations the trend holds. Only saw enough to observe the basic correlation to faith, not enough to really track it. A sustained rise in hunger for Bibles and a rise in economic productivity and even some longevity go together, for sure.]
It's really common for modern man to fancy himself more advanced than the ancients, because he thinks he has better toys, more ease. Guess again. No one has been able to duplicate the ancient genius in architecture, sculpting, poetry, politics, philosophy, biology, song and story; we only learn from them, and hopefully build on them. Modern science has had multiple dark ages; religion (of course) has always trended toward the banal, in quality. We actually know less about life than they did, but we have the technical proficiencies, to make up for that. We are less conversant, poorer in our desire and ability to communicate well; we are less interested in the quality of what we do, in the quality of the world around us; craftsmanship of any kind, is nearly extinct; we are more frenetic, robotic, shallow, animalistic, tallying our lives by number of do's, rather than Quality of Thought. So "advanced" is a term we should use with extreme caution.
Examples: man has known practically forever that the earth ran around the sun; he just uses poetic words to describe it. Nearly every holy book has some reference to that fact, not only the Bible. So also, the circulatory, respiratory, etc. systems in biology were well known: you couldn't be a butcher, priest, etc. without such knowledge. Obviously they managed to build the Gardens of Babylon and pyramids, etc. without our modern machines.
So again, just because it's easier for us to explain orbits, build buildings, etc. doesn't mean we are more 'advanced', internally. Ants are more proficient than humans, but can't think like we can. That's more a measure of 'advanced' — how agile, how creative, how good at independent analysis, is the 'brain'?
Our thinking agility is not as good as the ancients: name one good author since Shakespeare — other than maybe James Joyce and Frank Herbert; yet who understands them? Do you know, both authors had no end of trouble even getting published for years, because the publishing houses, didn't really understand what they were reading, and what little they did understand, they found offensive?
Bible is the most offensive, frankly, which is why all the translations euphemize the innumerable sexual, military, financial, and other 'unacceptable' words God had the authors pen in it. It was thoroughly intelligible to its initial audiences, who pretty much violently reacted as well: because they understood it. Of course, who really understands it, today? See, it's not just that the Biblical languages aren't used today: their wordplay and thought patterns are too sophisticated for our puny minds. When a Harvard guy like Julian Jaynes can't understand Amos (mistaking the metaphors for childish thinking), you can see man has DEVOLVED, not evolved, since. [Jaynes wrote a pro-evolution book with a long title. I don't remember all of it except "Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind." His central thesis is to show how man 'evolved' away from stupid thinking — like believing in God — and acquired a self-consciousness. He uses literature examples like Homer and Amos, and proves in those examples that he is the one whose mind broke down. Homer is yet unequaled in sophistication, say many classical Greek scholars. Amos is better still. Don't get me wrong, I love Julian Jaynes' stuff. But he mistakes concrete metaphors for limited thinking. Quite the contrary is true. metaphors tell you a whole bunch of analogous information, at once. Takes an agile mind, to link metaphors and fluently comprehend all the data they convey, at once.]
Adam and the woman were initially perfect, therefore genius, stronger, better, more agile — every superior talent you want to name. Which makes sense, given that they had to be made that smart, to Relate To God. So man has been progressively degenerating, en masse, since that initial state. Witness, how deft the writing of Bible is, compared to today's kindergarten-y communication. All that phenomenal wordplay in the Bible was understood by the audience; you can tell, by the way Bible writers play on prior wordplays; by extra-Biblical sources like Talmud and counterfeit holy books, which alike play on prior Bible wordplays (most notably, the Koran). [The Lord vs. Satan has a section on how Koranic wordplay against Bible demonstrates demon authorship of Koran, to show how demonic derision, plays.]
It requires great agility of mind to quickly form or understand wordplay. Bible is chock-full of it. Most ancient literature or philosophy is, too. But today? Well, compare any translation of an ancient work to the actual original languages, themselves. The translations are always much more sterile — because, we don't have the sheer wit, that they had in those ancient language uses. Language forms and reforms due to how people use it. So the decline in the variety and complex uses of language means the mind has devolved, because language has devolved. Every surviving language is much simpler than its ancient counterparts. So too, topics of conversation have become more basic, not more sophisticated (just more words). Meanings in words in common usage have become truncated, nuances between different words of similar import have become indistinguishable, vocabulary has shrunk so much, swear words have to be used to get a laugh or reaction, etc. You can observe the same phenomenon in music: Mozart, for example, was dinner music. Even the 'common people' had appreciation for all his nuances: Die Fleidermaus was for the lower classes. (So was all that Shakespeare wrote!) But today, 'opera' is considered high class? Well, yeah, compared to thump-thump-thump. I rest my case.
So God wrote clearly, and was understood. [Brief on Doctrine of Verbal Plenary Inspiration is accessible in the "Testing" box of links on Home Page.] That we don't understand His Writing today, is not merely due to the languages being long-dead (modern Hebrew and Greek are very different). It's more a case of the thinking being more dead. Ergo, the positively inane view that Genesis 1 is about the creation of the universe, not man, all the folderol about whether science agrees with the Bible, etc. People are arguing their own ideas, and really the Bible isn't being examined. No one pre-Christ mistook Genesis as being about the origin of the universe. The thinking was closer to Adam's day, then.
Of course, we also imagine ourselves more 'advanced' because we don't practice murder and mayhem as those 'primitives' back then. But look: today, we prefer to slaughter each other more often with words and laws, but it's still slaughter. A slower, more torturous kill. Wrecking lives by public exposure, kinda like what happened to Lizzie Borden after her trial. Murder by accusation, still. When was a nation ever so wigged out as we are, now? Isa28 records Samaria behaving in a national drunk-a-thon, the year before she was overrun. We are drunk with laws, though. New wines change.
Devolution looks like evolution, too. For, atrophy comes from disuse. Disuse rises due to ease. But ease is good, right? Yet the fewer barriers to ease in your life, the more atrophy obtains. So our 'advanced' society is really the more dead, because our relative ease compared to ancient times makes us the more atrophied; we've 'advanced', alright — in deadness, stupidity. Compare, if you will, the mental clarity and agility of ancient writings of any kind, or even ancient Roman graffiti, to today's urban, banal conversations; the former two are of starkly superior wit. Yet how much tougher their lives were! The athlete kills himself in training, usually about six hours a day. But the football star who stops play, soon develops a big abdomen. Devolution due to ease, 'progress'. Yeah, like cancer.
If you study societies in decline, you notice that complexity progresses, but not really quality. Art and architecture become much more ornate; laws multiply and come to govern even the most minor of human affairs. Taxes increase, as does bureaucracy, to handle so many new governmental encroachments into everyday citizen affairs. Business devolves from many small to a few very large, and cottage industries. There may not be much of a middle class, left. [A true middle class is independent of both the large business and the peasant. It's not an income measure, but an independence measure.] Welfare likewise increases and becomes viewed more as an entitlement than a temporary assist; nations surrounding such a society find it easier to snatch territories, and make economic inroads; the society's ability to compete with those around it both militarily and economically, weakens. Until at last, the society IMPLODES. In the final stages and prior to implosion, renewed vigor perhaps comes for some years, due to immigration (lagtime in recognition by those outside, that implosion is near); or, a conquering nation has the effect of reinvigorating its suppliant. Whether the society dies in a bang or a whimper (assimilation), if it doesn't rediscover its old vigor (which means struggle, small government, individual responsibility), it does die. Isaac Asimov's classic story about Trantor. Gibbon/Mommsen/Cary's chronicling of Rome's demise. The rise and fall of Sparta. France. Etc.
Um, God explained all this in Leviticus 26 and in His explanations via Moses as to why Israel was to displace the Canaanites. Aw, but that's just this quaint book which would save us billions of dollars in researching solutions from how the universe is constructed (LXX transformative additives of Isaiah 53:10-11 solves "unified field theory"), to what laws to pass (few and basic, Mosaic Law model). Oh well.
The characteristics of national/empire decline are long familiar to scholars of ancient Greece, Rome, Europe, Islam — but have you ever noticed, it's also happening on a global scale? Bible's description of society at the 'end' is of an advanced global nature. Technology need not be advanced (the 'end', as mentioned earlier, should have occurred over 1000 years ago) — but the societal mindset is 'advanced'. That is, complex. Socialistic, in our modern parlance. Top-heavy with government, laws; overfond of its cultural achievements, which are effeminate, at this point (witness late Rome); not too keen on fighting itself, but very keen on hiring others to do the fighting. Very big on gossip and victim-hunting. People are careful how they speak, lest they be the next victim. Lots of ennui, which is deemed sophistication. And so on. Decadence. Decline. Called the "latter days" now, the picture painted is that of a global society in a kind of languid repose, from the standpoint of values. Which it will regard as "advanced". Due to 'progress'. Just like cancer.
In sum, Satan's good-and-evil plan is meant to destroy the human race, and has that effect. So on a deeper Trial level, God proves that the good-and-evil merit mindset can only be destructive, even if Satan didn't intend to wipe out all God ever touches. So, while I suppose we like Satan can rail at being patsies in this Titanic Trial between the Lord vs. Satan, look how we end up being made heroes — well, if we want to be — look how we ourselves get the Blessing Of Seeing how merit is not the issue, not good, not what God wants. But instead, Love. Rapport is what He Freely Gives Us. Just for the believing.
Note how the two sides in the Trial, are demonstrated. God's no-merit arguments, produce happy people who of their own efforts, Want To Waste themselves, deeming what anyone would normally call "sacrifice", a pleasure to give away, Heb12:2. Satan's merit arguments, produce jaded people who of their own efforts, become frustrated; with the result that the only happiness they get, is to bewail themselves as victims, and to victimize others. You can't even hear the radio or television in America, nor look at any news on the internet, which doesn't howl about being the victim, or prowl for victims.
Satan's arguments have an underlying Tactical Strategy: see "STOP OMEGA" link in LvS4c.htm for a detailled summary of them. As the title implies, Satan is out to stop the Second Advent, and he aims to do it, by stressing Morality, Emotion, Gross Sin, and Apathy. So that man imagines himself, great — thus needing no Savior. Thus Not Voting For Relationship with God, #3 of God's Four-Part Answer. So, man will get what he wants, divorce. So to achieve that negative-vote goal, Satan must homogenize the human race, and he can't do that, with the Seven Barriers God created, standing. So man's natural proclivity toward good-and-evil, plus his natural devolution, are manipulated by means of promoting a no-god "good", which transcend the seven freedom-protecting, barriers.
And what is God doing? Well, God's arguments are proved, by Satan's. So at God's end, the only needed 'strategy', is to preserve the human race's ability to GET Bible. Which is where we Christians come in. Of course, if we don't Learn the Book ourselves, then we contribute to the downfall of the human race, as was briefly demonstrated above with respect to the victim-hunting and stupid national debates about steroids, etc., in America. So Satan must target Christians the most, faking them out that his MEGA plan, is God's Will.
All this Drama! Could what you believe have a bigger impact upon the human race? What A Paradox! A paradox, a paradox, a most amusing paradox! sang Fredrick and his nanny in "Pirates of Penzance". Here you are 21, but only 5! So, still under bondage to The Pirate King! Yeah, and God's Song of Doctrine frees you even while you stay chained down, nailed to a cross... whoo-hoo! So then you are rich even if poor, free even if a slave, high, even though low, child-bearing, even though sterile — God's Alchemy, Diamonds from doo-doo! Isaiah 54:1, sterile bears kids! Valley, exalted (Isaiah 40:4)! Alive, even if he dies (Jn11:25)! Because, after all — Infinity IS a paradox. Ta Panta, Everything high, Everything low, Everything good, Everything True: good truth, bad truth, any truth, because truth. For the Way the Truth and the Life was put to shameful spectacle; lifted up on the serpent so that even we menstrual rags, can be made Priest-Kings.
So just as this webpage began with Moses leading out the people, even through this Year of Our Lord 2007, all history continues to be ONE BIG EXODUS. Come out of her, my people: come out of the seductive harlot and Be Born To Me, says the Lord. Mimmennu — being BORN good-and-evil, now Be Really Born as only I, even I made you from the beginning — I Who Made Your Soul At Birth So You Can Share My Thoughts! (Concatenation of many original-language Bible texts, like Genesis 3:22, Isaiah 44:2, Psalm 139:14-17, especially v16-17; Jeremiah 51:45, Revelation 18:4 — Old Testament translations mangle and reverse birthing verses, so you can't see the birthing wordplay on how your soul doesn't exist until outside the womb. Caveat4.htm has more info on that meaning.)
This, the true meaning of your life, is not what you thought, huh. You are part of this Play, and in fact your part in this play is vital, if you're a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ. Even if you've been jaded, if you ever once believed, you're a believer and will be treated as one: by God, and by Satan (&Co.).
For you are not your own. You are an actor in this Trial, as is every other human being; it's only a question of Which Play you are in; for each Side in the Trial, has a "cast" of actors, and each Side gives these actors 'lines', though often the actors are clueless that the 'lines' are not their own. Because, NONE of the actors are their own persons: rather, We Are All Owned By One Choreographer or the other, main theme in 2 Peter (sotto voce, and not visible in translation), Revelation (bald, even in translation). Game/Play Plot: 'steal' from the other's cast. Winning: the Side with the higher Quality Testimony by the end, is the Victor. Guess which Side that will be.
Of course, the world scoffs at all this epic story, though it is as old as mankind himself. Never mind, all the evidence you can find if you know where to look and how to read. Never mind, the millions of witnesses in history, attesting to some above-view conflict going on, in every culture and generation ever on the planet, however mutated the stories might be. Oh, it's not scientific, to believe in God! Yeah, right: and sets contain themselves, too. Wars over Word.
So this constant warring, is like a classical Greek epic play series. Even what's banal, is dramatic. Real human history is thus a PLAY, for it is the TRIAL. Greek drama concepts were long popular worldwide, whether known as 'Greek', or not; what ended up being considered classical Greek drama during the "Age of Pericles" had roots going back to circa 3000 BC, and even before. All Greek plays were based on the premise that what happened on earth, was to play out divine intentions; to play out conflict going on 'above' man. Yeppers.
No wonder Bible so often in Old Testament and New Testament refers to Greek cultural concepts, especially Greek drama concepts, to explain the real 'play'. Since good-and-evil is Satan's mindset, and he's the ruler of the world pending Trial resolution, good-and-evil is man's natural mindset. Which plays out Satan's contention that creature merit should be the basis of relationships, including with God; which Play, is on us. We are the actors, the buffoons, the patsies. Or, the heroes — God-made. [Intransitive verb sunergew in Romans 8:28 is used transitively. That's a deliberate cultural device Paul employs to show How God makes heroes. Greek scripts used intransitive verbs for villains to speak; transitive verbs for the heroes to speak. Clever way of showing how "agathos" (Divine good, never human good, lamely translated "good" in Rom8:28) is manufactured out of Christ's Thinking (main theme of Romans 8). See also the clever Greek wordplay devices used in Ephesians 2:10, Philippians 2:12-13. As to human history being a Trial 'play': Revelation is crafted in classical Greek Drama (four-play series) style. If you don't know how Greek Drama is structured, most of the Bible, and definitely Revelation, will be misinterpreted. Sadly, scholars began to abandon recognition of Bible using Greek drama (i.e., Attic Greek) beginning sometime in the 1930's; Bible scholarship has thus greatly suffered, since (with a few bright lights remaining — God always provides)! LvS4c.htm's "Revelation: a Play within a Play" link sketches an outline. In it, there is yet another longer link when you first see that table, which outlines the Book of Revelation, itself, so you know how to divide out the events.]
Classical Greek plays were in sets/series of FOUR; kinda like our modern mini-series (Lord of the Rings, Matrix, Star Wars). Of course, the plots (and major subplots) of each play are intertwined inter-play, as well as intra-play. All gets resolved in the final play. At the beginning of the series, was a monologue which set up the plot; at the end, an epilogue which gave the moral of the story. (Greeks were big on bucking-up morals.) What follows below is but one configuration style of this play. God, being Infinite, is really playing in all configuration styles, none of them excluded, and none contradicting, yet all telling the same story without gerrymandering even a speck of dust!
The Quadrilogy Of Lord vs. Satan, Our Real History
Monologue: for us, the Old Testament (see 1 Corinthians 10, Hebrews 1,4,11; 1 Peter 1:10-12); overall theme is the Initial Revelation Of Christ. Old Testament itself is a series of four plays, all about the 1st Advent of Christ. Epic Greek play series usually end with deus-ex-machina, a mechanical device which hung above the stage; a human was put in it, and then lowered — to depict a 'god' descending to help/save/reward the hero(es) in some key way. So, too, here: only this time, it's the Real God 'descending', get it? What in English we call "to save" really first means "to rescue", in Greek (sozo, sotereia). Classical ending to a classical play!
All the New Testament writers use this Greek Drama analogy, and liken the Old Testament as the setup monologue for the New. You won't be able to see it in translation, because Greek Drama stylistics and words are used to convey it. John's epic, choral style is marked. Peter uses some hexameter verse and likens our spiritual assets to the financial backing of a play; Paul likes the dramatic flair of actor speech, and loves making epic analogies to famous plots; the writer of Hebrews treats his whole letter as an epic play answering how the Old Testament finds completion "with us" (Hebrews 11:39-40, 12:23). Luke writes Acts in split-screen scenes (genitive absolute), showing how Old Testament is fulfilled. It's awesome, how well intertwined the Greek Drama style is woven, in the New Testament. So the following plot divisions result:
Notice how the pre-New Testament 'plays' parallel each of the New Testament plays' meanings, in this configuration. Notice what's missing: the Trib. That's an interlude between Play #3 and #4. RevPlay.htm blocks out four plays as well, differently configured from the above, except that it subsumes the Tribulation as the prelude to Play #4. In Revelation, Play #1 is Church, Revelation 1:1-4:1; Chapters 4~5 are the Title Deed ceremony; 6 represents the same trends as happened since the Fall being ordained to continue in Trib. #2 is Trib proper, Revelation 7~18, though the tableau sequences play paradigmally during Church, since Rapture can't be predicted (= Daniel 9:26's time character, mass politico-religious movements and persecutions, Israel being Out Of Contract because No Temple). #3 and #4 are Mill and the Eternal State, Chapters 19-22:5. Epilogue is #22:6ff, and is to Church. References throughout are classical Greek drama and tie-backs to Old Testament references. There's nothing allegorical, secret, or "encoded" about it. It's very brash, maybe like the mime plays common in Domitian's day which ridiculed Christians, using heraldry in Revelation 4 (but derived from Ezekiel 1:10ff), etc.
So Enter, New Testament play #1, THE SALVATION PLAY: just as the Greek play monologue was part and parcel of the play script, so too, here. Gospels link Old Testament and New Testament together, and their 'time' (Bible keyword) is really still the Old Testament covenant, Law of Moses. But also New, for Christ is on Earth. So, a Nexus Man (God-MAN, get it?) in a Nexus Time in that Nexus Land which bridges three continents (God never misses a chance at punning), Israel. That's why Christ goes to Israel, for He IS a Son of Israel. Its Foremost Son. To pick up His Bride. So, they gotta Vote on whether they will Accept Him as Messiah, a prophecy long foretold (and warned about) in the Old Testament, i.e., in Daniel 9:25-26.
God Speaks Through His Son: God's contention is that Grace Alone Should Be The Basis For Relationship, Not Works. So, Believe in His Son. Same Script, since Genesis 3:21 (see also Genesis 15:6, 'quoted and referenced regularly, in New Testament). Play opens with Christ On Earth, Explaining He's The Messiah, And Will Pay For Our Sins. He's here to Collect His Bride, Israel, but too few among the sons of Israel believe in Him. So, before He goes to the Cross, He tells Peter He'll get a new Bride, since Vashti (Israel!) rejected Him — fulfilling the many-versed Old Testament promise of calling out the Gentiles, but in a way not forecast in the Old Testsament — Matthew 16:18. He will build the Church On Himself (Greek Petra always means the Rock=Christ, in Old Testament.) [Those who claim Peter is the one on whom Christ builds the Church are flat stupid, or lying. Can't mistake the Greek of this verse, and there is no excuse. "Petra" is a very common Old Testament name for Christ, and references the BEDROCK on which the Ark sat. See, there's no way to interpret it as referencing Peter. "Petros", the wordplay the Lord uses in Matthew 16:18 to 'name' Peter, is a chip off the Bedrock, get it? Peter sure did: he makes wordplays on his little-stone name, in his epistles!]
So, He goes to the Cross against all opposition, succeeds, and Ascends. Father Seats Him (meaning Christ is now King-Priest Ruler, see Hebrews 5~7). Hence, The Real Gospel Is Fulfilled, just as promised in the Old Testament since Genesis 3:15. Gospel, meaning "Royal/Official Good News Proclamation", of a one-time simple faith in Christ, is alone the proper juridical basis to save a human, since good-and-evil Divorce God. So the one believing, first came to the conclusion that his own 'merit' was irrelevant. Satan needs to mangle the Gospel, since it is predicated on the fact self has no merit: "believe in Christ" means you have No merit, which is WHY you believe.
Christ wins over Satan as a result, thus vesting in His "kata-Melchizedek" Battlefield Royal Patent promised from eternity past, before there was a creation, Psalm 110. Book of Hebrews is dedicated to explaining this other Kingship, since it's what the CHURCH inherits. Church is not Israel. Israel had a shot at this OTHER role, that of Bride when Messiah came. His King of Israel Patent requires no Bride, see 2 Samuel 7 (the Ruler Himself rules forever, doesn't found a dynasty, see also Isaiah 53:8, which says He'll have no descendants: in Hebrew and LXX clearly, in English fuzzy). So the two "walls" (covenants, kingships, priesthoods) of Israel and Church, interlock IN Christ, but themselves are not the same.
Christians don't understand the Two Kingships. So they will bethink themselves actors here in New Testament Play #1. Big mistake.
So if there is a Trial, and merit is the Trial issue, and you believe in Christ, you also agree with God's 'side' in the Trial. THAT REMOVES YOU FROM THE STAGE. Whether you know it, or not. Doesn't matter if you know. Does matter how and why you choose. Hence, if you believe AND "x" verb, salvation is not legal, and you are NOT saved; and, you agree with Satan's 'side' in the Trial. Again, whether you know it, or not. So, if you ever believed AND 'did' something (walk an aisle, got baptised, made-Christ-Lord, blah blah blah) you're not saved, but FANTASIZE that you are. Slowly starving to death, with hell as dessert. (So merely, only, just BELIEVE in Christ now, if you ever combined "believe" with some other verbs, before. At which moment, you are forever saved: Acts 16:31, Greek.)
Play #1 is still running ONLY for unbelievers, who are ALL the 'cast', in it. The individual drama is that once you BELIEVE in Christ, you are NO LONGER in Play #1. You stop being an actor, and instead become Chorus. In Greek drama, the chorus is not in the play, but narrates key meanings of the play. They are MESSENGERS to actors, not actors themselves. For this Play #1 is Satan's world.
Even though we are post-Cross, to the unbeliever, there is no Savior they yet recognize. So to the mind of the 'cast', it's still the 1st Advent, so to speak. Most of us Christians already know we Represent Christ down here (New Testament "witness" verses, 1 John 4:17c, Greek), but — God help the unbeliever! We don't usually recognize that we are chorus, NOT worldly actors (chorus was charged with advising the actors and revealing plot). The Gospels make this choral role quite clear from the way the authors keep themselves OUT of the drama, mentioning themselves only in third person (i.e., John's Gospel at the end) when necessary. The Gospel is about Christ, not us. Hint, hint. Paul reaffirms this choral role time and again, viz., when he says he determined only to know Christ crucified (1 Corinthians 1:23, 2:2). Keep it simple, stupid...
For, Play #1, is Satan's world. But we are not of the world, anymore: we were ransomed to God. Thus In The World, But No Longer Of The World. Christ frequently reminded the disciples of this distinction, so they could prepare for hostility. So, they were to be wise lambs. Lambs are quiet, not loud. So, New Testament epistles carry that refrain; Paul reminds us we are Citizens Of Heaven, so are Ambassadors to the world, not citizens of it; John spends much of 1 John advising how to BE out of the world; James counselled being "unspotted" from the world (play on Passover lamb).
Ergo the do's, are all calming in nature: basically, thoughtfulness, so the unbeliever has no cause de guerre. We don't take each other to court; we act as 'model citizens' of our home nations (Rom13), paying taxes and whatever else is owed civilly; we don't revile when reviled, and, as John says in 1 John 4, we shouldn't be surprised if the world hates us. All this advice, adds up to a Background Role. Choral, not actor. Not one single item on the Christian right agenda, for example, conforms to this advice: so that agenda plays Actor, not chorus. Such an agenda has been repeated many times in history, and each time, it wrecks havoc. Play #3, is Effect Of Church On Human History, and follows below.[Which is a big reason why Romans 13 and other passages warn against Christian activism, and why the Revelation 17 harlot is Christian, for crying out loud. We aren't worldly actors, so we shouldn't be acting, get it? John can't make it plainer in Revelation, by showing Both the Lord and the Church as OFFSTAGE, i.e., Revelation 4:1 forward. Church isn't mentioned after that, except via the to-audience interjective device of "I come suddenly", and in the Epilogue (which is also for the audience, Revelation 22:6-21).] Play #1 ends during Play #4.
Enter, Play #2, CHURCH FORMATION/WITNESS: this play has the opposite cast, and the opposite role, compared to Play #1. Here, the 'cast' is ONLY believers, so an unbeliever is cast in this play the very nanosecond he first believes in Christ, and is No Longer In Play #1 As An Actor (but becomes part of its chorus). This play is to God and the angels, not to mankind; so it is a Toward-Heaven Play, not a toward-Earth play. The believer is Snatched Out Of Satan's Kingdom, So Is No Longer Of The World, So Is No Longer An Actor In The World, But Rather a Citizen (Greek: politeuma) of Heaven. So, this Play #2 is 'in Heaven', even though the believer, like an emissary (Greek: diakonos, and sometimes, presbuteros), is still physically on earth.
Every New Testament writer emphasizes this fact in his own way, and stridently, too. Book of Hebrews centers on this fact, but since key verses are mistranslated, you can't see it in translation. For example, Hebrews 11:1 tells you the Trial Criterion of Word-Believed In You (see Heb111.htm), followed by a roster of Old Testasment Witnesses, showing their believings. Never works. And that Witness is all TO Heaven (i.e., no one was around when Moses decided to leave Egypt).
John's very dramatic, in his use of deceptively-simple vocabulary of homeyness (i.e., Greek keyword menw, essentially elaborating on the Lord's "abide" description in John 15). We Abide In Him, not in the world. Since He's in Heaven, so are we. So Revelation, even though paradigmally depicting Church trends (Play #3, actually), is written with John OUTSIDE the drama. Because, the Lord is Risen And Ruling, and John is in Him. Dunno how it could be made plainer...
You can see why Satan would be miffed about this loss of personnel; why the elect angels shout for joy every time a human becomes a believer (Luke 2 and 15:7,10 — note context). Being self-righteous, he's power-hungry, even over us puny humans. Much more, those other fallen angels under his rule. Jealous, even though despising us, demons really hanker to control us and make us puppets. They've done a fabulous job of it, going by Christendom's sordid history. We don't even usually state the Gospel aright!
So the part of the Drama is to see how many believers recognize what is the real spiritual life (learning Scripture) versus Satan's wrong-stage, good-and-evil counterfeit. The latter, is a subplot belonging to Play #1, in which we are Chorus, not actors. The Challenge: Did we know to change roles when we became believers, or are we still playing like unbelievers do?
It takes quite some time to realize what being "saved", means. There are so many pitfalls in the beginning. Because, we really are born again: we are stupid and drooling babies. So any ol' claim will look right, if it sounds soothing or otherwise-attractive. So this subplot is really a very major drama, and in fact all human history hangs on whether we awaken to the fact we belong in Play #2, not Play #1. Play #3's outcomes are ALL determined by what happens in this subplot.
So Luke dramatically illustrates in his distinctive drama Greek (especially via genitive absolutes), that from the moment Church is born at Pentecost, Satan mangles Scripture to believers, i.e., to claim that you're spiritual if you're doing "works". Notice carefully how Luke's Acts descriptions are usually restricted to how believers interact (usually, they act stupidly); very little is said about interaction with unbelievers, except to witness Christ — and even that, is initiated by the unbeliever or forced by circumstance (jailer, Paul's shipwreck). Moreover, the unbelievers are pretty much props, dispatched by God on 'errands' (like the Romans who saved Paul from the crowd, the Jews in court, etc).
So because Play #2 is toward Heaven, Satan's always trying to get believers to be actors on earth in Play #1, as IF we were still UNbelievers; to pull us OUT of the Play #1's chorus (analogous to Matthew 24:23), so he can satirize us better; so he can manipulate the outcome of Play #3, better. For, God must discipline us when we commit adikia ("wrongdoing"), and what hurts us, hurts the world (more about that follows, in Play #3). The more everyone is hurting, the more they will go for Satan's counterfeit gospel, religion, etc. "Hurting", means real harm, not necessarily pain. In fact, if you want to lure an animal into a trap, you first give him lots of comfort, so he'll stop being wary.
Satan's efficacy in luring us onto Play #1, and his sense of humor, is proven every time you listen to Christians. For Acts is used to justify the very goofinesses which Luke so deftly displays as strayings. Paul's goofiness is a big subplot — who figures that out? The only pastor I know of who teaches about it, is my own. All that tongues business, and the miracles people, etc. pull their justifications from Acts. But more than anything else, Acts is a chronicle of How Christianity Was Wacky. Peter drawing lots for apostle(!); practicing communism; Paul letting his hair grow, twice! People starry-eyed about money contributed (Ananias and Sapphira); imitators of healings or prophesying; riots and schism (between Paul and Jerusalem church), courtroom scenes .. on and on and on. It's not a pretty picture: what scenes depict people learning the Word quietly (well, that Ethiopian eunuch and the Bereans)?
The effect of a pullout from Play #2, is devastating. First, we are supposed to be actors in Play #2, not Play #1. So we are Rejecting God when we don't learn Scripture; we've in effect gone AWOL (absent without leave, a court-martialworthy offense — Paul uses the Greek version of the term, metatithemi, in Galatians 1:6; parallel passage is proagw in 2 John 9). So we are to be punished for that reason. If you wanna preview of how bad the punishment is, look what happened to Paul in Acts 21, when he pulled out from his God-given role because he wanted to witness to the Jews, which he knew God prohibited.
Worse, we are also playing the wrong role in Play #1. So, then: how can the unbeliever tell the difference between the Real God, and all the counterfeits, if the real believer is just another actor? And if just another actor, then the Real God goes undetected; for, then bible is just another holy book, looking just like all the others, always with the hand out, always beating you up to be a good boy or girl... Romans 2! The Name of the Lord is blasphemed because of us. So who'll believe our report? Like the demon said to the seven sons of Sceva, Jesus I know and Paul I know, but who are you? [Acts 19:15. Really interesting that "estamai" is used for "know" in that verse.]
So note that when believers MISinterpret Scripture, they always go for visible stuff: works, political involvement, magical claims (cannibalistic interpretation of Eucharist), etc. Current subplots in this vein are sadly patent: prolife crusade, health foods (as if spiritual), magical/goofy fixations (tongues and healing, new-age), (in US) a constitutional amendment on marriage (guess God can't handle it, Himself?), etc. More will be said about the impact of being on the wrong stage, in Play #3.
You can easily detect any misinterpretation of Scripture: each one reverses the nature of merit, just like in the Garden (Genesis 3), i.e., exhorting/claiming man must/can cause his own merit. But "1" doesn't come from zero, ever. Thus, misinterpretations are always foolish (since merit is never a cause, but only an effect, even in the very nature of God). Thus, misinterpretations always negate faith, so any misuses of Scripture will be ABuses. Always suspect as a lie any claim which stresses man and his role. God is the one to be glorified, not man. God does the doing, not man. If Christ Was A Lamb, then we have to be lambs, too! Lambs don't have political agendas, they don't run around and crusade, they don't intrude in people's private lives, they don't 'give up' stuff, etc. See what a mockery Satan has made of Christianity? Who among us does not know Christ as Lamb? So how do we go around, like bulls? It's bull, allright. Look at the funny human animals war with each other! This is more fun than we had with the dinosaurs! Look at God's own war with each other, how delicious! And they think they are doing great things for the Most High! hahahahahahahahah!
Because Satan is out to mock God. Hence religion is his invention; hence works is his siren song. Satan's fixated on reversing everything Divine, and he is extremely successful at reversing Bible interpretation, so that we Christians starve to death, since Bible is our only spiritual food source (Matthew 4:4). (The Caveats, accessible from Home Page, cover in too much detail just how successful Satan is at mangling Christian teaching, right now. Evidence is overwhelming. "Thinking" series is helpful too, though its focus is only peripherally concerned with Christian distortions.)
So what constitutes a HERO in Play #2, toward Heaven? The One Learning Christ, 2 Peter 3:18. This learning has no swashbuckling characteristics, for it is always below-radar: 1 Corinthians 12:23-24. Remember how God's part of the Old Testament sacrifice was taken from the undesirable parts? The offal, the blood, the fat, kidneys, etc.? So too, the 'sacrifice' of the hero, is to 'do' what no one else wants: Learn Christ. That verse pair depicts the normal believer desires to be important, noticed, worthwhile. But note how the covered up parts are what reproduce: as my pastor has stressed many times, Paul is talking about genitals, here: translations euphemize. [Sometime in late 1999, or maybe earlier in the year, my pastor began stridently covering 1 Corinthians 13, because he felt he had miscast the role of Love in God's Attributes; and in the lead-up exegesis to that Chapter, he talked about the meaning of 1 Corinthians 12:19ff. This path led him to realize that "Love is the Integrity of God!", which from what I can tell on the internet and other research, is the biggest theological RECOVERY of what Scripture has been saying all along, since Canon was closed. ArchiDes.htm has details on that. Back to the passage: as is usual with Bible verses, there are many layers of meaning to 1 Corinthians 12:23-24. The one stated is but one layer, and doesn't preclude visible roles. Paul's first addressing the believer concern over whether their visible roles are good enough — see the good-and-evil mindset? But on many other levels, like the toward God level, this verse pair demonstrates the essential Invisibility of what is the Real Spiritual Life: thinking Scripturally, toward God.]
For God to beget you and make you begetting, here's the procedure: you just get under your right pastor, breathe 1 John 1:9 and keep on learning and using what you learn, 24/7. That's it. No running around witnessing, works at the church, etc. All that running is useless to Him. You get such things as desserts, not deserts. And you will enjoy them in the act, not groan and wait to get paid later, sigh. God loves a cheerful giver, so He gives you what will cheer you, once you have the capacity for it. You will be wanting to pay for, rather be paid, because you enjoy so much! It seems unfair to have so much enjoyment, and not pay for it! Which capacity you get, by getting His Son's Thinking in you. At which point, you can beget a dessert or two. All this, always and only under the power of the Holy Spirit. Anything else, is awon/adikia — wrongdoing, distortion, wood/hay/stubble, fit only for burning at the Bema (Romans 5:10, 1 Corinthians 3:11-16, 2 Corinthians 5:10).
Always suspect as a lie any claim which stresses man and his role. Mainstream Christianity is the Revelation 17 harlot, not God's Will. Mainstream Christianity is playing on the wrong stage, #1's. So is making lots of wood hay stubble for the Bema and calling it spiritual. Note the arrogance of mainstream Christianity: it's all about PEOPLE. Replacing God in the First Commandment. God made us, so God takes care of us, and if we sully the Word of God to distort it into works, then we are the gods, and we're selling people as the gods. That's what all religion, and particulary polytheistic religion, always does. So we are no different, we've trampled His Holy Name in the dust, and then we have the colossal gall to expect a reward from Him. Yep, and the reward is Burning at the Bema. So never think that your studying is somehow less important. You are the reproducer, and they are thinking ill of anyone like you, and they will get their comeuppance at the Bema. Pharisees, all. So you be the publican (i.e., Luke 18:13), who cared about what God did for him, and what GOD wanted, and he wanted to know God; rather than bragging about himself!
Revelation 17 people can't read Bible, and whatever they read they spin according to Satan's dictates. You can see that in Bible mistranslations, practically every verse spun to glorify man and (literally!) cut God's Headship out of the original-language texts; so you don't SEE in the translation, what the original constantly says: it's Only God, Who Works. So if only God, then you study God as your 'work', which is not even your work, but the Holy Spirit remaking you, just like He remade the earth in Genesis 1:2ff. Whatever else you do with your body, is therefore holy, because the Thinking in you runs your body: i.e., you're using 1 John 1:9 often, and getting more and more in the habit of using Bible you already know, 'upon' every circumstance in your life, principle of Matthew 4:4. That's TRIAL EVIDENCE, and it's enormous. Even if you brush your teeth, wait in line: GOD HEARS that "sweet savor", which is exactly how our sins were paid for on the Cross, by His Thinking. So now you emulate Christ. Not, the Revelation 17 hucksters who are crazier than bedbugs, misinterpreting every word in the Word, knowing nothing.
The learning is fun, at first. Everything is new, and you see how much Grace you are getting, so your good-and-evil mindset gets to take a lot of vacations. After awhile, though, the sin nature will begin to chafe. For the longer one persists in the learning, the more he separates from others. Even if ostensibly together with others, the mind begins to separate from them. Because, your mind is changing. Your values are changing. That's what all the pouring-in of Truth, is designed to do to you, and, like James notes in James 1:1-2:26, that's Doctrine's Work — His Thinking Lives (Hebrews 4:12). So you, change. It's spiritual growth, which Bible analogizes to human growth (baby, child, young adult, adult, mature, Pleroma). [Translated "fullness", the latter is a Greek word worthy of study and tracing. Lexicons euphemize it, for the term has heavy god-makes-pregnant overtones.]
Learning to be 'invisible' is probably the hardest lesson in the Christian life. But it shouldn't be, since we all know that Moses was 'invisible' those 40 years in the desert, before he went back to collect Israel; Paul had 14 years in some Arabian wasteland (Gal2:1); we all know that Jesus Christ Himself was 'invisible' to the world for the first 30 years of His Own Perfect life, and is 'invisible' now, being Risen And Ruling. So we need time ALONE with God, and a lot of it. The solitude will not be easy, for the sin nature is addicted to herding. Remember how easily Satan got Adam to sew those fig leaves, even though Adam had seen God the Son (as Theophany), and constantly, for who-knows-how-many years prior?
Greatness, requires a long preparation in solitude. For, who really sees a Ruler? Very few: we hear about President Bush, but who really sees him, up close? Yet we Christians are being trained to become rulers, kings under the King of Kings (i.e., Revelation 1:6, 5:10, 1 Corinthians 4:8). So we are to See Him Who Is Invisible, all the time, like Moses did (Hebrews 11:23-28, especially v.27 — ties to Hebrews 11:1, 3 — Greek of 11:1 is astounding). God is Invisible, 1 John 4:12. Yet, we see Him through His Thinking. Truth, His Thinking, is Inherently Meritorious. But also, Invisible, in that thought itself is not visible per se.
This combination of His Thinking Attributes, Invisibility and Merit, shape the Main Testimony in the Trial. For, nothing goes against humanity more, than to be alone. Merit Separates. Invisibility Separates. Sanctifies (lit. Greek: sets apart), so Separates. Not good, that even GOD should be alone! There are Three! Christ thus was invisible most of His Life down here, because the Testimony is, Knowing God Is Meritorious. Meritorious, because He's God. So wanting to know God is meritorious. Again, it's meritorious, because He's God. Not because we want. OBJECT is the Merit, not subject. So 'subject' is MADE merit, in 'reply' to the many iterations of wanting to know, since Truth is poured into the one wanting to know, So That He Can Know God. Such pouring in, changes the person. Made Christ, "the Way, the Truth, and the Life." Notice how Truth is in the 'center' of that verse. How "Way" (way of salvation, "Way" being the ancient name for Christianity) and "Life" are results of being Truth.
So Satan's argument about merit falls flat on its face: what's MERIT, is God, so what's merit in a finite person, is Knowing God. Not, what the person does. Yet, the person is made meritorious by virtue of that selfsame knowledge. Because, it is Truth. How Awesome, this result, from a desire that of itself, deserves nothing? We don't deserve, to know God. But Satan's all about, deserving. Good/evil is all about, deserving.
See, the whole point is that it's undeserved. We don't deserve to 'see' God, at all. But look: God is 'undeserved', in that He didn't make Himself. 'Invisibly', He responds to His Own Uncreated Nature, with Infinite Humility. I didn't make Myself, so I don't 'deserve' to be God, I just AM. Hence His Humorous Self-Name to Moses at the Burning Bush (Exodus 3:14): I AM WHAT I AM. I AM WHO I AM. I AM I AM. [Exodus 3:14 is awesome, because the Hebrew starts, "And Elohim said.." "Elohim", not "Jehovah Elohim". Satan used "Elohim" as an epithet, in Genesis 3:1, as if God wasn't even worthy to be a Person. So for God to call Himself by only His Last Name, is astounding. See, "Elohim" is God's 'last name', so to speak, since Three Gods Exist.. a Family. So it's Each Member Testifying through the Son's 'mouth', to Moses. Awesome!] Consummate Humility, displayed in that Ineffable Name (Paul picks up on this in 1 Corinthians 15:10). Absolute Existence. No beginning, no cause, no ending, no effort. The Grace of Being God is where God 'starts' from, in His Assessments. Once you understand that, you will really take off, spiritually. God responds to His Own Greatness with total humility. So, being uncreated Most High, Most-Low is what He elects: 1 Timothy 2:5 shows His Rationale. (I swear, this is the most important fact to understand about God. Life will never be the same, after you 'get' it.)
So as time passes, it gets harder to stay on track in the spiritual life, still invisible, still 'only' Learning The Book. It's hard to live with the enthusiasm of what you are learning, hard to not 'help' others by giving them the answers you are getting. The undeservedness of your growing prosperity in Seeing Him becomes the greatest pressure you will ever know: for, as you grow, you the more realize how you cannot ever 'repay' the extreme chesedth (mercy/kindness/lovingkindness) done TO you. It will always be impossible. For you, like God, are undeserved. Consequently, there's no deserving mechanism to enable repayment. It's not in God, so it can't be anywhere else. Satan fantasizes one. By this point in your spiritual life, you know better than he does, that the most you can do, is.. nothing. Thus is born the first of many future desires to become a worm, a lamb... Just because. Just because, He is. Just because, you are. Just because He is Who He is, and just because by His Grace, you are who you are. At that point, you reflect Paul's thinking in 1 Corinthians 15:10, which reflects, Christ's. Who is also, God.
God is Amazed to BE God. Christ was Amazed to BE Christ. The believer will be increasingly amazed to be who he's becoming. For, the more Truth you know, the more amazed you are, at it.
So, the accumulating Doctrine the Holy Spirit keeps on depositing into you Builds Divine Viewpoint (my pastor's term); causes you to you wake up one morning (as it were) and realize how small everything else, is. Kinda like a dying man, you look out on the world and realize how much time is wasted on "earthly things" — but the only dying, is the dying of your old attraction to those same 'earthly things'. The realization is once a Great Blessing.. and, a curse. For, now life down here becomes anti-climactic. Little things begin to bug you as never before; what you used to cherish, you now recognize as despicable. Because, everything down here is 'becoming' smaller in your growing recognition of Truth. Imagine, then, how it was for The Perfect Man! How did He survive all the Knowlege? For ignorance really is bliss, but Knowledge is burden. And, greatest Blessing.
But at this point the Blessing of it hurts, as the highest blessings always do. There are intermittent periods of cockiness, born partly from the pressure of iconoclasm your sin nature experiences, as the old idols crumble. Coupled with your newfound doctrinal competence, some bullishness occurs: i'm-gonna-fix-these-ills, tell everyone about the real answer, etc. You get spanked, grow, fall, grow, etc. Eventually you settle out, and then the going gets real intense. Kinda like becoming a singularity, your inner nature condenses. For, Truth is infinite, taking up no time and space — therefore everything else is drawn into it. So outwardly, you might have ease, but inwardly.. 2 Corinthians 10:5! You're trying to bring every thought into captivity! The command pressure is extreme. LordvSatan3.htm's "First Reason for Invisibility" maps out the growth stages, if you can't wait any longer to learn them. On a macro level, the idea is for each believer to go through this growth process: each one of us gets enough time to do it. No matter how little or how long, God knows what "enough", is.
A believer grown up in Him is truly a miracle. Having started little better than an animal Satan (&Co.). can thought-control at whim, the person who believes in Christ and stays under the spiritual life, is made a person of such glory, even the demons need to shut up. Of course, the person thus made doesn't think of himself as being so high; but everyone else sure does. Like God, such a believer becomes more humble, the more he grows. For, he grows increasingly aware that everything about him, is undeserved. Hence the eventual need (yes, need) to be crushed like grapes; to be a worm of THE Worm. All the kingdoms of the world are not enough; he needs more than that, to find outlet for his gratitude; gratitude, for being so undeservedly made; undeservedly knowing Gorgeous God; undeservedly competent in the spiritual life.
Such a believer comes to view himself impersonally, respecting what has been done TO him. And his love for God, reciprocating, is caused to result in superhuman thinking which, though occurring in a person who remains no better than menstrual rags of himself, achieves beauty greater than man can even imagine. All playing invisibly, so far as other humans can tell. Which invisibility is just how such a believer wants it to be. For, he's not achieving anything to be admired, but rather to express his own admiration of GOD. Particularly, His Son's Humanity. For by then, all of the Son's nature, is "God" to him.
Elect angels are depicted in Scripture as having what we would consider largely menial roles: running the weather (Revelation 7), carting the Lord around (Ezekiel), giving messages from God to mankind, protecting believers, accompanying Him as an army (sabbaoth, usually mistranslated "hosts"), throwing their crowns down before Him (Revelation 4). They really have stupendous authority and roles within their own societies. And they are fighting the demons, themselves (viz., Daniel 10). Yet on the occasions where Scripture shows a human meeting them, and the human, overawed by their beauty, falls down in prostrate worship (Daniel, John in Revelation) — these are the only occasions you see them show rebuke: "Don't DO that!" the angel said to John (Revelation 19:10). Now, maybe, you understand why: to do even the smallest task in association with The Angel Of The Lord (another title for Christ), is so vast an HONOR! It's not self-abasement, it's Admiration. Love. For Love renders even a menstrual rag, beautiful. Satan will never understand that. But we believers, can. Well, eventually...
So this play runs coterminously with the other Plays, but ends at Revelation 4:1, the Rapture (really, exanastasis, "rapture" being an Anglicized term from Latin Vulgate of what in English is 1 Thessalonians 4:17's snatched-up). Only believers are actors in this Play, because it's post-salvation. What happens in this play, determines all subplots of the next two plays. For, just as Christ controls history (i.e., Acts 17:26) so also His Bride is given the role of determining history. [Exhaustively explained in LordvSatan4.htm's four subpages.]
Enter, Play #3, THE EPIC EFFECT OF CHURCH ON HISTORY: all angels and all humankind are in this Play as actors, though the angels are invisible to man right now. Believers are the stars (bad or good), and unbelievers are those affected by the stars, even though as stars, believers aren't known. (Christ is risen, so believer importance is likewise invisible.) Play #3 is the amalgamated result of Plays #1 and #2, and is on earth. We know it as "history". The Crusades, for example, are part of an overall Play #3 subplot, the evil historical trends depicted (metaphorically) in Revelation 6~19, with emphasis on Revelation 17.
Principle of Romans 2: when we play chorus but should be actors (Play #2), or play actors but should be chorus (Play #1), God's Name ends up being misrepresented: so we must be visibly spanked. What happened to Paul in Acts 22 is of the same mien. So 9/11 was a spanking, for example (note how the purpose was visibly against Christians). All mankind is affected by how we learn and grow in our assigned roles in these two plays. So a "9/11" is no one's fault, but the believer's. In Greek drama, this is known as the "tragic flaw", an Odysseus who ends up badly because He goes off course (ekpiptw, Galatians 5:4, nautical term). And, the tragedy affects everyone around the hero, not merely him!
LordvSatan4.htm is hugely devoted to this topic, so more won't be said, here. It's so beyond-the-pale, how influential God has made us hapless believers. Its subpages are the most dense of the "Thinking" series. Frankly, it's almost too shocking to read, and way too convincing to forget. Sometimes there's such a thing as too much proof. If you're gonna read it, try skimming Lvs4a.htm (first subpage, on Precedence), first, not stopping to quarrel with anything, until you see the overall picture painted. It's a biggie. Remember from the beginning of the "Trial Issues" of this webpage, how Satan's angling for a MISTRIAL? The stakes couldn't be higher.
Gist: the salt/remnant principle, blessing-by-association. Rephrased in terms of our 'plays', here: if enough believers are actors in Play #2, all here in Play #3, get blessed; so the Industrial Revolution, for example, was due to a whole lot of actors being in Play #2. If too many believers are playing actors on the wrong stage (in Play #1), then everyone here in Play #3, get cursed; the Dark Ages was evidence of too many flippin' over to Play #1; today's history is veering in the same direction. The truly weird thing is, the ratio is very small. Only takes a few believers in a nation growing up in Him fully, to preserve the entire country, no matter how bad it has become!
This 'salt' relationship between believers and history was always true: Leviticus 26 and Deuteronomy 28 spell out its provisions, which provisions are for humankind, so the cessation of the Mosaic Law (Hebrews 7:18, Chapters 8) didn't abrogate those clauses. But even before, look: there'd have been no Cain (name is a play on salvation, means "Purchased", "Acquired" — Eve's firstborn, Genesis 4:1), if Adam and the woman hadn't believed in Christ. So, no human race. Witness also how Israel came from the loins of Abraham, due to his faith; next, the Nation Israel, from Moses (alone!) and later due to Joshua and Caleb's faith. Then the Ultiimate Salt Person, Christ, Who preserves the whole human race, so everyone has enough time to choose to believe in Him. So now, enter Church: with Christ Risen and Ruling, the believer's role due to His Status is Royally Bigger. "First Reason for Royalty" and its other Three Reasons in LordvSatan3.htm explain further, though you may need to start back on LordvSatan1.htm, to get the proper context.
My pastor sums up what I'm calling Play #3, thus: "As goes the believer, so goes the client nation..so goes human history." How true. I almost wish I didn't know this. See, because the believer belongs to heaven, but is on earth; because the unbeliever rejects God, there's no juridical avenue of blessing TO the human race except through the believer. Remember, this is Satan's world. If we should be acting in Play #2, but aren't, the flow of blessing narrows. It means we are to blame. The unbeliever — which we all were, once — is condemned to slavery under Satan, only to go to hell, afterwards. We can't change their minds, and shouldn't try. We just stand around, in case we are asked. Meanwhile, if we play in Play #2, then they get blessed. It's the loving thing to do.. but we're not doing it. Hence 9/11. We're so fond of our crusades and public-nesses, we slipped off to the wrong stage. Prognosis is not good.
Luke's Acts and the New Testament epistles (including all Revelation, in its post-Cross-historical-trend usage, though Chapters 1~3 are also literally applicable), tell us what happens, structurally: from 30AD onward, you see the growth of the Revelation 17 harlot: she starts small, in the Jerusalem church. Paul tries to fix that problem, though the Lord told him not to (see Acts 22, Galatians 1~2); so Paul gets beaten up, taken to Rome anyway. Schism! With the harlot gaining full ascendancy, by 300AD, and the four horsemen running throughout (Revelation). The pattern has not much changed. In the 1700's~1800's there was a remarkable surge of interest in God, worldwide: that's why we 'suddenly' found so many manuscripts (MSS), and Scriptural scholarship had great gains. But now, interest is really sagging. We can't even get the Gospel right! [All prophecy is double-entendre, dual-usage. Revelation is no exception. The current generation is to interpret the prophecy paradigmally, not literally. A parallel future generation is to interpret it literally. So too, when you look back at Old Testament (or New Testament portions known to be past), you derive paradigmal lessons.]
No wonder everyone stuck on merit is always so miserable! Oh, rocks, fall on us! we say, as we end our lives. No wonder the world is always so miserable, fantasizing meaning which doesn't exist! No wonder the next party, the next election, the next spouse, the next new car, the next defeat of the infidel, always disappoints! Like Jeremiah (17:5) says, "cursed is the man who puts his trust in man; who makes his flesh his arm [strength, merit]." By contrast, Bible Doctrine, aka "the true riches", "gold/silver/precious stones", "wisdom", "water", "hope", never disappoints (Romans 5:5). Because, Bible is poured into us by God, so it is Love (another moniker for Bible, famously used in 1 Corinthians 13). Love really does make the world go round. God grants yet another day, fertilizing the fig tree one more time...
Play #3 runs until the Rapture, though its last thread terminates in Play #4, with reference to unbelievers and those who don't become believers, until the Rapture occurs. Because, the 'salt' of Church have a legacy which continues during the Tribulation even though no 'church' is in the Tribulation: so those tortured folks will get more blessing than they could have otherwise had! God thinks of everything.
Closing play #4, God wins, Christ Returns to Rule and Finish the Trial: All of humankind, dead and alive, will at some point be onstage. Romans 8, much of Old Testament prophecy, and Revelation 4+, tell this play. Romans 8 is the outline, Revelation 4 onward, becomes literal at the moment the Rapture actually occurs. At that point, eventually enough of Church, despite her inner harlotry tendencies to misuse Bible, will have grown up spiritually to "Pleroma" — frequent Greek Bible keyword with pregnant-by-god overtones, i.e., in Ephesians 3:19 — so Church 'completes', and so the Rapture occurs (Revelation 4:1). Then the Tribulation begins (kicked off BY Rapture): a seven-year warning that Christ is Returning, just as promised in the Old Testament; so the spiritual life reverts back to a mini-version Old Testament spiritual (i.e., visible, ritual) style. Satan crafts a FAKE CHURCH to ferret out all real believers and Jews, in order to pogromize them; and, (ideally) to bring about his idea of the Millennium, before Christ returns. Now you know why a Fake Church (indicated in Revelation 17 by "mystery"+"harlot") is needed. Note there how it's always political control coupled with religious justification. In short, another Crusade.
The Fake Church began in the 90's AD, with the "Church Fathers": just read their puerile writings sometime, see for yourself how off-course they were from understanding Scripture they could READ in the original-language texts. I almost vomited when reading Clement I; you can see that letter and many others by clicking on the "Early Christian writers" link near the top of PopeMyth.htm. Now: why, if the Fake Church is for the Trib, to fake out people THEN that it is of Christ — why is it here, now? Dummy: because Satan doesn't know when the Rapture will happen, either. So he started right away, with the Lord's Own Half-Brother, James, crafting a fake Christianity. James eventually woke up (but not before making a lot of errors, as we all do), sided with Paul, and was rewarded for that by his brethren in Christ (including Jewish unbelievers, I can't tell the mix) — beating him to death and throwing him off a cliff. Then, post mortem, he's villified as if holy by some of the most famous among the Church Fathers, as if living in the Temple, unwashed, fasting all the time (an illegal practice, capisce).
Ever since that time, the Revelation 17 harlot has been developing apace. Very strong, very mainstream now, and you can hardly find a 'Christian' who realizes how blatantly Revelation 17 is advertised as if 'Christian'. Every Bible documentary, every TV series is about the FAKE Church, not the real one. So we don't know what's the Real One. Thus a PAPER TRAIL is left, and since people are so stupidly enamored of "old", well.. it becomes easy to propagate the Fake Church, with its fake doctrines and fake gospels (1 Timothy 4:1, 2 Timothy 4:3ff). So you don't catch on to the True Royally Invisible Spiritual Life in the Bible. Because, you're not reading the Bible, you're looking at PEOPLE. Thus has been the sordid history of Christendom in Play #3. Thus it will be in Play #4.
By a Fake Church Crusading, effective HERDING can be accomplished. Then as now, many who genuinely believe in Christ will be innocently drawn in. SatSpin.htm shows a scenario to give you the flavor of the strategy and tactics employed then — which are being used, even now. For you have to herd the animals, to slaughter them!
During this Tribulation time on earth, up in Heaven the Lord opens up His Title Deed to Planet Earth (Revelation 4~5). As a consequence, all those horrible warnings and angels flying mid-heaven, and witnesses, etc. occur. Greatest war in history occurs in the last half, because Satan doesn't succeed, so all he has left as a tactic, is to get everyone to kill each other: his motive is still to cause a MISTRIAL. See, God has promised Christ will return. If no one is left who wants His Return, or no Jews remain, then God 'failed' to keep His Promise. God promised to deliver the Jews in the OT, and He promises to bring about the Millennium, in which a sufficient "remnant" of Jews will enter. So killing everyone — which God allows, k? — means God is a Bad Ruler, so a MISTRIAL VERDICT should be granted.
Finally, when it seems those few Trib believers fighting in Jerusalem will be overcome, the Lord Returns. We Church return with Him at His Second Advent, and a few of Church are onstage as Visible Rulers over Gentile nations, in the Millennium (the bulk of Church will be visible, too.. as underlings, a Testimony To Failing To Act in Play #2). Millennium is a kind of post-script, with reference to the Trial itself; creating the very world Satan had tried to make, so Satan is let out under what he considers ideal circumstances, to finally overturn the Son. By the end of the Millennium, after 1000 years of Perfect Environment (no hunger, no crime, no deprivations of any kind), much of mankind revolts! So, punning on Greek ending-drama vehicle of deus ex machina, Satan is released from prison to lead the rebellers to victory, but.. Ooops! it didn't work! Valhalla next gets burned up, a new universe comes into existence, and all believers and elect angels live happily ever after. Really, this time. No more fairy tails wagging man's motives!
An intellectual like moi would find this entire play, rather.. um, fanciful. So though I believed what my pastor taught as he went through Revelation verse by verse in the original languages — and he's a Phi Beta Kappa, no intellectual slouch — I sorta dismissed a lot of this stuff. Believed it but didn't analyze it. Bad move. When you analyze (instead of become anal), you realize how sensible a story this is; and the empirical proof is so overwhelming, once you see it, you try to disbelieve.. but can't. Mirroring.htm, MirrorNOW.htm and LvS4a.htm spend a lot of time on how to analyze the information: for if you can see the orchestration of Time around the Jews (focus of Mirroring); if you can see how the Cross totally galvanized the human race historically (subfocus in LvS4a.htm), then it's not so farfetched to see how this spectacularity is real, i.e., focus of MirrorNOW shows how Time is being Orchestrated around the rollout of Scripture for the common man, since it's been satanically kidnapped and messed with in translations, ever since the Crucifixion. All this is pretty shocking; takes some downtime reading and analyzing, breathing 1 John 1:9 so you are sane as you read. Not at all like the ANALyzing goofballs who chirp about the end times, oh brother. We don't do anything about it, either. No crusading. G-2 intelligence, and that's it. God runs Time, so He runs the rest, too...
Revelation's Warning to Church: God is out to reproduce Christ IN you, not works by you. Every Greek quadrilogy ends with what they called a "moral", the message to live on in your daily life. In Revelation, that message is concentrated in Revelation 22:6-21, but also sprinkled throughout it and the rest of the NT: I come suddenly! Greek word "tachu", always mistranslated "soon" or "quickly" in English Bibles, means in Greek, "suddenly, next-in-sequence, without prior warning"; it's a military term. Sudden surprise is critical to sound military doctrine. Even more, to sound spiritual doctrine. We are to use this knowledge of the future, to discern Now what to avoid, where our lives Now are headed. Always context, context, context. For if you don't know where you are on the map, you'll drive to the wrong place. The right place for us Now, is Play #2. Toward God, not people. We see the disaster of to-people replacement of God as the Evil first commandment, in Revelation. That's what disbelief does, and why it disbelieves: one wants to be his own god, call his own shots, decide his own destiny. Yeah, and for rejecting having heard God, you get herded by Satan (&Co.), so still aren't 'your own', at all. We are not our own. So we don't live on our own. So we live on the Word. Not, on this world, and not on people's ideas. For they are being herded for the slaughter. So we groan privately; grow privately; get His Thinking privately; wait for the Deliverance of the Lord, theme of Romans 8.
Bible repeats that fact a bizillion ways, and in the original languages it's impossible to mistake. Isaiah also likens it to pregnancy, in Hebrew/Greek of Isaiah 52-55, passim; Paul too, many times in his epistles: last half of Romans 8 is a mini-pregnancy play. Of course, the Bride analogy proves perfectly that a person is being made, not a set of goodies: then again, Adam in the Garden did no works. Man in the Millennium isn't to do works, either.
Satan really has a hold on us. Look how our standards reflect evil: we are supposed to carry our eyes at half-mast, act euphemistically, demonstrate 'erudition' and 'respect' via long speeches in which nothing is said, but the vocabulary is impressive; or, roll our eyes heavenward in lieu of vocabulary; and hustle our buns, baby. That's what passes as 'respectable' and 'holy' and.. makes God look colorless, Puritanical. Gee whiz. No wonder academia and politics and religion are always so blah blah blah: full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. No wonder Bible is so diluted in translation, putting the reader to sleep!
Yet, do you ever see Christ act this way in the Gospels? Even the translations can't mask Him wholly. He was so direct and so politically-incorrect, it wasn't funny! Where oh where do Christians get the idea He was 'nice'? He called people dogs, whitewashed tombstones, little-faiths (lit. Greek), hypocrites, children, and other not-nice names. He excoriated those who praised His Miracles as being only interested in the miracles, He turned away the groupies, and befriended those everyone else, hated (tax collectors, prostitutes, etc). No wonder everyone turned on Him: just like the Jerusalem believers turned on Paul, in Acts 21:17ff. Act nice, be hypocritical, then thrust in the dagger, baby. Anything to destroy Grace and Truth. If Christ returned today as He was then, the Christian right would turn on Him faster than the earth spins. For He supports none of their causes, and instead labels them scurrilious: Revelation 17 harlot is as nasty a name for them, as the Bible can state.
How odd: if we found a thousand-dollar bill on the street, we'd be thrilled; but God wants to make us bizillionaires for free, no strings.. and we're offended? Well, yeah we are. Why, makes no sense! But then, fig leaves never did make sense. We like fancying ourselves holy via fig leaves. Or, we'd not buy that limp idea generation after generation after generation. Back in Jerome's day, Bible was written in this weird script which no one could read, but it was oh-so-pretty. For hundreds of years afterward, Bibles were encrusted with jewels, laden with fancy pictures, kissed, and generally looked at, not looked into. Or, locked to the altar. Read Christopher DeHamel's The Book, sometime (I bought mine at Amazon.com): see for yourself.
Today we have readable text. Even the original-language texts are freely available on the internet, but almost no one reads them? No one who claims Bible (or more popularly, Psalm 139) says there is a real baby in a womb, has ever really read the original-language texts. But then, they don't get the Gospel right, either, despite the English texts like John 3:16 and Acts 16:31. See, if The Real Treasure Of Scripture is trampled underfoot, how much more do we disdain being made into God's Treasure from His Son's Thinking? What, shall Scripture largely go back into hiding, with only portions available, as it largely had been, between circa 200AD (when people stopped being able to read the Greek) — and about 1800, with only 'breakouts' every 200 (or so) years? Past is prologue: already the Bible is hiding in plain sight, even though our generation, unlike those prior, has unprecedented access to the original-language texts. Money right under our nose, but we still sew those fig leaves: actors in Play #1, not Play #2 where we belong...
Epilogue (Revelation 22:6-21): Learn The Book! Doctrine is determinative. For, Doctrine is Christ's Own Thinking, hence Love (Romans 5:5, 1 Corinthians 13:4ff.) Christ BECAME the Truth. Truth, stands. So Truth, successfully bore all sins. For, nothing can knock down Truth. So whatever flaws, whatever works, they all count for nothing. Truth IN you does the DDNA work, just as it did for Christ ON the Cross (and of course, before it). So what is Good, is to Get Truth Accumulating in you. Learning Scripture, living on Scripture (Matthew 4:4, again). 24/7. Even while sleeping, or brushing your teeth! What you think, not what you do. What you think, not whether you have a booger in your nose. What you think, not whether you have a fancy job, 'share Christ' in revival rallies, give away all your possessions, starve yourself for others. [See 1 Corinthians 13:3, though Greek kauthesomai (to be burned) was not in Bible (scribal error), but instead, kauchesomai, (that I may boast). Translations still haven't fixed this obvious error (the word kauthesomai didn't exist until the Byzantine era).] For, you are a Royal Priest under the King-Priest (theme of Hebrews 5~10). So Doctrine is determinative, and nothing else. What you think from/to/about/of Him: that's the "sweet savor" to Father! [All websites amplify this paragraph, but links at pagetop perhaps best answer all potential objections which the mind will of course pose. Of them, DueDisclosure and Part III of the "Thinking" series are most directly on the Priesthood topic. DDNA covers the 'spiritual biology' of the Holy Spirit's Recombinant Nurturing Agency, His re-engineering and its effects in your soul, on your life, in the Trial.]
Revelation 22:17-21 are downright scary. Greek Drama always uses poetic stock images, and here in Revelation they tie to the Old Testament. "Water of Life" is the Word, and the reference is to Isaiah 55. The warning phrases about adding or subtracting from the Word (the Whole Word, which ends with Revelation, not just Revelation) relate to false representation, which is a capital offense incurred by a Representative (Ambassador, that's us, see 2 Corinthians 5:20 and DueDisclosure.htm). The phrasing "add to" or "subtract from" are Hebraic idioms for adulterating the Word in thought, speech, teaching, or translating. Serious stuff. Who among us ever gets Scripture wholly right? We all deserve public execution!
When you are executed for a capital offense, you lose your property. The word (in KJV) translated "part" is Greek word "meros", and points back to Isaiah 53:12 as nearly all Bible verses do, referencing Your Eternity-Past Conditional Inheritance, post-salvation (extensively covered in LordvSatan3.htm's links). So no rewards at the Bema, and you yourself will be saved (1 Corinthians 3). Makes one not want to write webpages: what if I'm misrepresenting Him? Makes one want to hunker down and learn this Word before saying or doing, anything.
So all the mainstream 'Christian' stuff will get the plagues and the loss of inheritance at the Bema. Makes you want to cry in sackcloth and ashes forever. But instead, you must train to become a King, as that is what honors the King Who Bought You, His Sovereign Eternal Majesty, the King of Kings and Lord of Lords, Ho PantoKrator Alpha and Omega.. the Lord Jesus Christ. Yes, come Lord Jesus: for we are all weltering in our blood even post-salvation, Ezekiel 16:6.
"Come" in Revelation 22:17 et seq. is in Greek, the imperative of entreaty, what a subordinate says to a Superior when he strongly believes a given action is needed in the interests of the organization: here, the "organization" encompasses every soul ever born in all history, angelic or human. Only believers in Church can say this, for we are Royal Priests and Bride forever. It's not "inviting", but Voting. Voting is what you do every time you choose to think Bible, learn Bible, use 1 John 1:9 so you can recover from the spiritual apnea which is worse than sin (it's adikia, the abuse of justice by a judge, see 1 John 1:9 and Colossians 3:25 in Greek). So Our Voting Is What Determines Rapture Timing, as the New Testament constantly stresses. All Part IV of "Thinking" series is on the voting precedences and God's parameters, etc., so more won't be said here. So Vote With Your Thinking, Live In God's System.. or, expect to be very embarrassed for a short time at the Bema, and live like a moron (relatively speaking, for we are all gigantic then) ever after. Like mainstream Christianity will.
So where do you wanna be, in this Merit-on-Trial you didn't create? You didn't ask to be a witness in it — but you are. See the paradox? You didn't create yourself, nor your role, nor your importance should you desire it, to God Himself. Could you be more important, than to become through learning Christ's Thinking, a potential hero God makes? Nope. Did you create that status quo? Nope. But you have it. A Gift. No flaw in you (perceived or real) matters. No talent/ability in you (perceived or real) matters. No matter what you are/were/will be, whether axe-murderer or the most 'saintly' person who ever lived, Only what God makes of you, matters. Whew. What a relief. Now if a booger or a hair sticks out somewhere, you need not get 'anal', heh. So who's gonna make you? God.. or..you? Your sovereign choice, every second of every day, playing before God and His Angels, fallen and elect...
, Human Savior wins and becomes the Last Adam. This is the play for UNBELIEVERS to discover. We are Chorus in this Play, not actors. We tell them the plot.
