| Jesus will win! | DYordy.com | Christ in you! | |||||
| Fulfilling the New Covenant | |||||||
|
Part One Living in Heaven and Earth "When I consider Your heavens, the work of Your fingers . . . What is man that You are mindful of him, or the son of man that You visit him? You have made him a little lower than angels (Elohim), and You have crowned him with glory and honor . ." David What is man? Who are we? What are we? What are we for? These questions have stirred the hearts of men for thousands of years. Every man and woman descended from Adam knows that life is not what it ought to be. Life as we know it is not what it was meant to be. We are groping in the darkness; things are not clear. This question that David asks here in Psalms 8 is echoed down through the centuries. What is man; why would God pay attention to him? Psalms 8:5 says, "You have made him a little lower than the angels." That word in the Hebrew is not angels it is "Elohim," "You have made him a little lower than God." "Elohim" is the same word found in Genesis 1:1, "In the beginning, Elohim created the heavens and the earth." Of course, that was a bit much for the people of Israel at that time to consider, and so their tradition translated this into angels, instead of God. But it was not said that way by David. You have made him a little lower than God, You have put all things under his feet. Then we look at Psalm 22 to see this extreme contradiction of what we think we are. Psalm 22 is the thoughts of Jesus upon the cross, given to his forefather, David, hundreds of years before. "My God, My God, why have You forsaken me?" Verse 6: "But I am a worm, and no man, a reproach of men, and despised by the people." Even Jesus, hanging upon the cross, despised and mocked, came to this conclusion about himself in his humanity, "I am a worm and no man." We find ourselves in this great contradiction. What is man? We have a sense of a glory that has been lost, we have the sense of something great that we once knew that is gone far from our ability to reach for it. We sense a future that ought to be, yet we look at ourselves now, and we are tempted to say with Jesus, "I am a worm and no man." What is man? What is man that God has so focused His attention on him? The writer of Hebrews refers to this passage from David. "'What is man that You are mindful of him . . . You have put all things in subjection under his feet.' For in that He put all in subjection under him, He left nothing that is not put under him. But now we do not yet see all things under him. But we see Jesus . . ." Hebrews 2:6-9. God put all things into subjection under man, there is nothing that is not put under man. But right now we don't see it. We don't see how all things could be under our feet. We look at our lives and we don't see how it could possibly be said that we are in command of the situation. Everything seems out of control. We do not yet see all things put under our feet. But we do see Jesus, "who was made a little lower than the angels, for the suffering of death crowned with glory and honor, that He, by the grace of God, might taste death for everyone. For it was fitting for Him, for whom are all things and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings." verses 9-10. Here in verse ten, the writer of Hebrews refers to the same thing Paul said in Romans 8:29. The purpose of God is to have many sons conformed to the image of Jesus Christ. God is bringing many sons to glory. Verse 11 "He is not ashamed to call them brethren." Verse 14 "Inasmuch then as the children have partaken of flesh and blood, He Himself likewise shared in the same, that through death He might destroy him who had the power of death, that is the devil." Verse 17 - "Therefore in all things He had to be made like His brethren . . ." In asking the question, what is man, the Spirit of God tells us, "Look at Jesus." You want to know the answer to this question, look at Jesus. We don't see who and what we are when we look at ourselves separately from Jesus, but we look at Jesus because we were created to be conformed to His image. He was made like us that we might be made like Him. We are becoming who we are. In setting the stage, I would like to go through the teachings of Paul in Romans and Corinthians concerning the nature of man and the nature of salvation. What does it mean that He is conforming us to Himself? First, "But he that is joined to the Lord is one spirit with Him." 1 Corinthians 6:17. What is man? I would like to share with you my present understanding of our human makeup. The person--me--I am one who thinks, I am one who feels, I am one who chooses. And in the center of this one who thinks, who feels, who chooses, is my heart. And my heart is all the expression of my desire, my dreams, my hopes. I am a living soul. My mind, my will, my emotions, at the center of which is my heart, all that I desire, that is me. That is the me that Jesus shed his blood and died in order to acquire the ability to purchase me for Himself. I am the pearl of great value. Jesus, coming upon this field which is my life, saw that pearl, my heart; He converted everything that He owned, His life, into the purchase price, His blood, that He might purchase for Himself the treasure that He saw, my heart. That He might have my heart for His dwelling place. Now, as a living soul, as a human, I live in two worlds. The universe has two parts to it. There are not multiple universes, there is one universe that has two parts. These two parts are intrinsically related together, and yet they are very different. These two parts relate with one another all the time but they are different in makeup. On the one side of the universe is physical matter. In that part of the universe, you have the stars, the planets, space, time, the earth, animals, plants, everything of the earth. All those things are the physical side of the universe. Then you have the spiritual side of the universe. In the spiritual side of the universe, you have the several levels of heaven. You have the place of the dead, where the dead are reserved in judgment. On the spiritual side of the universe you have angels. It is my suspicion that just as with animals, you have many many different kinds of creatures of various sizes and shapes and orders and purposes, so the word 'angels' refers to a very similar arena of many different types of beings. God always gets carried away with Himself when He creates. He never creates in moderation, but always with abundance. And inside that realm we call angels are creatures of great size and tiny creatures, many different kinds and shapes and ways of beings and purposes of expressions, and we call all of that vast realm of created beings, angels. And these two realms are related closely together. But although the spiritual realm has full view of the physical realm, the physical realm is limited in its view, the physical realm cannot see the spiritual realm. But the two interrelate all the time. Man is different. Man is the only being created by God who lives in both the physical realm and the spiritual realm at the same time. That's why Jesus, while He walked this earth, said, "The Son of man who is in heaven." Jesus was in heaven and in the earth at the same time. He lived in the heavenlies and He lived in the earth. Man was created to live in both sides of the universe at the same time. And here is how. God gave me two bodies: a physical body and a spiritual body. I, me, my heart, as it works through my mind, will, and emotions, I can relate to and communicate with and correspond to and manipulate the physical world through my physical body. At the same time, I can relate to and communicate with and be a part of the heavenly world with my spirit, my spiritual body. Through my physical body I speak to physical beings, through my spiritual body, I speak with spiritual beings. God is a spirit. And I relate to Him through my spirit, my spiritual body. Now, at the moment that Adam bit his teeth into the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, his spirit died. Before then Adam could communicate with and live in both realms. Adam could communicate freely with the animals in the garden. At the same time, Adam walked with God and could communicate fully and freely in the spiritual realm with God. But then, at the moment Adam sinned, his spirit was cut off from God, it lost its ability to communicate with and see the heavenly realms. It was still there in a twisted form, but it was cut off from knowing God. He could still reach out towards God as through a glass darkly, with his spirit, but from that point on, for Adam or his children to turn to the spiritual side of the universe through their spiritual bodies, all they could contact would be the realms of fallen angels and the occult and the demonic. That's why God put such strict laws in the Old Testament concerning the realm of the occult, fallen spiritual realms. "Don't go there," He said, because the moment you reach out in your fallen spirit to the spiritual realms, the only thing you will contact is the demonic. It is not possible for fallen man to contact any part of the heavenly realms other than the demonic. That's why God said don't do it. At the same time, death also came to Adam's physical body. It did not perish into the dust at that moment. But in the day in which Adam was created, in the 1000 year time period, Adam's physical body died and crumbled into the dust. The moment Adam sinned, death came into his body, sin and death. It was now subject to sickness, to deterioration, old age and the diminishing of its faculties until finally it returned to the dust. But even after physical death, Adam continued, Adam, himself, did not vanish. Adam continued in the place of the dead, a holding place, as a living soul with all the desires of his heart that he ever had, with his own mind still functioning, his own emotions, his own will, his own person. But in that place of the dead, Adam had neither a physical body through which he could fulfill his desires in the physical realms nor did he have a spiritual body through which he could touch the heavens of God, the godly side of the heavenly realms. There Adam sat, waiting, without the ability to express himself or to communicate either with the earth or the heavens of God. And so, all the way through the Old Testament, God dealt with a people in whose bodies was the nature of sin, and because of sin, death. These were a people who had fallen spirits, spirits that could not connect with the heavens of God. If they tried to contact the heavenly realms, all they could touch were the realms of the demonic, far more powerful and prevalent than the earth has known since the cross of Christ. It is my suspicion that before Jesus died, the interplay and operation of demons in the lives of men was far greater, far more open than it has been since Jesus spoiled the powers and principalities upon the cross. But during the centuries of God's dealings with Israel, because of the coming blood of Jesus, the Spirit of God was able to speak through individuals, through Moses, through David, and the prophets. And through those individuals, God could speak to His people. God lived in their midst in the temple, but in doing so, He erected barriers around Himself, barriers that could only be crossed with blood, the blood pointing to the coming blood of Jesus. And thus God could fulfill his purpose, in some fashion, of making His home among men. But only in a distant sort of way, not the way He intended. Then we come to the cross and the resurrection of Jesus Christ. For the first time, now, God could begin the work of His intention. From the time Adam fell until the time of the resurrection of Jesus, God held man in a holding pattern. All the development of the human experience, all that God had in mind – we do not fully understand why God waited those 4000 years. But God waited 4000 years until He began this process by which He is forming us into the image of Jesus Christ. And God begins that process in us in our spirit. There we were, minding our own business one day, when, unknown to us, the Spirit of God hovered over us in our darkness. Whether we were in a meeting or talking to some person or reading a book, the Holy Spirit hovered over us and in the midst of that Holy Spirit came a word into us and we believed that word and in the moment of believing that word under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, we were born again. "Having been born again, not of corruptible seed but incorruptible, through the word of God which lives and abides forever." 1 Peter 1:23 An incorruptible word, an incorruptible seed, that came from God into us, birthed us again, anew. Now this word 'born again' that Peter uses and the word John used in his gospel when Jesus said, "You must be born again," this word is not the same as the English word "born." It is the Greek word, gennao. Here in Peter it is the word anna gennao, 'born from above.' The word gennao corresponds with the English word 'conceived.' At the time when that word came, a new life was conceived inside of us. Our spirit was restored. We could now communicate with God's side of the heavenly realms. We could now live and walk in the spiritual realms safely because we walk in the Holy Spirit, in the realm where the angels who serve God live and operate. We can go straight into the heavenlies, completely bypassing that savage area of the heavenly realms that fallen man cannot get beyond, the occult realms. We can live and walk in the heavenly realms with Jesus because our spirit, our spiritual body has been restored, we have been born again, a new life is working inside of us. I want to, in this series, go through two lines of thought. The first is, what does it mean that I am born again? What does that mean? Sadly, so many Christians revert back to their defining verse, "The goal of the believer is to go to heaven when you die." And now, being born again means "You're gonna go to heaven when you die and that's all it means. I have been marked by Jesus, and now when I die, I get to go to heaven instead of hell." I have heard pastors teaching on John 3, and they laughed at Nicodemus, when Jesus said, "Most assuredly I say to you, you must be born again." And Nicodemus said, "How can a man be born again when he is old, can he go back into his mothers womb and be born?" They laugh at Nicodemus for being so silly. You see, it never entered into Nicodemus' mind that Jesus was saying, "This is an initiation into being a Christian, and it simply means you're going to heaven when you die." That never entered into Nicodemus mind. Nicodemus was grappling with what Jesus was saying. And even though he saw it only through his natural understanding, he was much closer to the truth than many of those pastors who chuckle at his naiveté. Because Jesus was talking about a conception and a birth. Jesus was not talking about where you go when you die, he was talking about a conception and a birth. So, we want to teach on what it means to be born again, but we also want to look at the question of our body and our spirit. Because as Paul takes us through the explanation of the gospel in the book of Romans primarily, he centers his argument on the body. The working out of our salvation is focused on the physical body. It is critical for us to understand the importance of our bodies in the salvation of Jesus Christ. The physical body is central. That is why it is so important for us as we live in the allotted time God has given us in these bodies, it is so important for us to take advantage of them, because being conformed into the image of Jesus Christ takes place in our physical bodies, it is in our physical bodies that God is doing this work. Our physical body is central to the plan and purpose of God, as is our spiritual body. Both bodies are important, and we need to understand the role of these two parts of us in what God is doing in our lives. I want to look at one more verse here, John 3:16. I'd like to bring us back to that question of the goal of the believer and how we interpret the New Testament. "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but possess the life of the age to come." Now, it is a very, very sad thing that, because in the mind of most Christians the defining verse of the New Covenant is "The goal of the believer is to go to heaven when you die," we see that concept forcing itself upon every verse and changing what it says into something it does not say. Here is how so many dear believers read this verse. They don't read what it says, they read it different. "For whoever believes in him will not go to hell, but will go to heaven when they die. God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might go to heaven when they die." Isn't that how you read it so many times. But that isn't what it says, is it? "He who believes in Him should not perish, but possess the life of the age to come." What is eternal life? God tells us in John 17:3. "This is eternal life (the life of the age to come,) that they may know You, the only true God and Jesus Christ whom you have sent." 'To know,' here, is the most intimate relationship of the most pure and perfect intimacy that is possible in God. "He that believes in Him will come into an intimacy with God and with Jesus beyond the conception of our present minds." 1 John 5:11 "And this is the testimony that God has given us already, we have eternal life. And this life is in the Son, he that believes on the Son has that life." It is not saying anything about a ticket to go to heaven when we die. Not at all. God has given us an intimacy and a closeness with Himself, an intimacy, an entwining, beyond what we can understand. "He that is joined to the Lord is one spirit with Him." This life is in the Son, and the Son lives in my heart. When I look at my heart, I see Jesus, I do not blaspheme Him by seeing selfishness and deceit. When I look at my heart, I see Jesus. I see the very life of God. I am born again. I am conceived of God from an incorruptible seed, a heavenly seed, that has come out of the very bosom and being of the Father. That seed came into my spirit, and I am a new creation. I am not that which I was before I was born again. Before I was born again, I was one thing, but now that I am born again, I am a totally different kind of being than I was before. Jesus is inside of every part of me, and I, in every part of myself, am utterly inside of Him. What is man? The answer to that question, we dare not fall short of. So many Christians see themselves as nothing more than sinners, sinful humans. God has had mercy upon them, and He has decided to rescue them after they vacate the earth because He had pity on them and that's all there is. You know, that understanding has absolutely no relationship with the New Covenant whatsoever. This is not the covenant we have with God. I have been conceived from above. An incorruptible seed came into me, and I was born anew. I have eternal life, that is, I have in me an intimacy with the Father beyond what my present understanding is able to conceive. What is man that God pays so much attention to him? What is man that God would take everything He created, both in the heavens and in the earth, and under the earth, that He would take everything He created and make it subject to me. Put it under my feet. That He would give me command over all that He created. What is man? Part 2: The Explosive Moment of the New Creation > |
|||||||