CHRIST
I just want to make a couple of seasonal comments brethren, as large parts of the world and a large part of this country rises up to do the religious works of men which gratify their souls and their carnal minds, those who are truly in Christ, in whom are truly justified by his blood, and walking closely with him, huddle in their homes communing with Christ. Brethren salvation is through union or communion with Christ, it is not in the works of the law, we all know that, but neither is it in the religious works of men, no matter what they might be including, this pagan celebration that the whole world calls Christmas, which you if you haven't heard, means, who knows what it means, does anybody remember what it means, Christmas?
COMMENT: Christ mass?
PASTOR VITALE: Which means what? This sister said it means Christ mass, and what does that mean? Anybody, it means the death of Christ brethren, it means the death of Christ, it is the celebration of his death. Mass is the celebration for the dead, you didn't know that? It is the celebration of the death of Christ. But we read the Bible you see, and he says the spirit of life entered into him, he who was killed at the beginning of time, the righteousness that was in the creation, that was killed at the beginning of time, the spirit of life has entered into him in the form of the man Jesus of Nazareth. And we're on the way back up, we no longer celebrate his death brethren.
Okay we're going to have a short message tonight, and we're still on the Christ, we're going to be in the book of Galatians, we'll do a few Scriptures in the book of Galatians on Christ.
As you may or may not know, this is a very important book with regard to what we're teaching here, in particular chapter 2, where Paul describes his own crucifixion, and I remind you brethren that the this book was written before, I'm told that tradition says Paul was actually crucified. That may be true I have never studied it myself, but when Paul speaks about his crucifixion brethren, he is not speaking about the crucifixion of his body, he's speaking about the crucifixion of his carnal mind and this is one of the strongest if not the strongest witness that we have in the Scripture, that the crucifixion of Christ does not kill, did not kill Christ in the man Jesus of Nazareth, and does not kill Christ and will not kill Christ in us, but in fact will kill our carnal mind, when Christ in you is crucified to your carnal mind, your carnal mind is the one that will die. And a basic principle that the Lord is hitting home here is that the crucifixion of the man Jesus is an event, or was an event that is totally separate and distinct from the crucifixion of Christ, Christ being the mind the righteous mind that was in the man Jesus.
So we are preaching here that the man Jesus was crucified, that his body was killed, that the father raised him from the dead in three days, and that he ascended and in this hour is pouring out of his spirit upon all flesh, and reproducing the life or the mind of Christ in whomsoever he will. And we're also preaching that Christ is the spirit of God expressed through a man, and that that spirit of God was expressed through the creation at its inception, and the way that is described in the Scripture is in the phrase "and God set Adam upright in the garden" he imputed righteousness to him, by giving him a mind that was in the image of the father, even though Adam had had no experiences at all, and especially no experiences with evil, God said he was righteous and we see that in the church today. God has declared his church righteous, we don't deserve it, and we are not actually righteous, but he has declared us righteous and therefore we have received many benefits from him, and this righteous mind which was in Adam at the beginning of time was killed by the carnal mind and the death of the righteous mind in the man Adam caused the whole man to fall, because brethren in accordance with our mind that is whether we stand or fall.
If our mind, if our thought patterns, if our ability to reason is the righteousness of God, the whole body is made alive, and lives, but if our mind, if our thought process if our morality is the death of the carnal mind, the whole body the whole creation receives death, and the Lord is revealing to us that the man is a creation which can be good or evil, and whether or not he is good or evil is dependant upon the way he thinks, it's dependant upon the mind that is in him.
So we can have the same man and one day he's a dirty no good sinner and then the next day he's received a measure of Christ, and his whole life changes. At the beginning of time we saw a righteous man whose mind was changed violently the Scripture says, that righteous mind of Christ was violently killed by the carnal mind casting the whole creation down to this age where we became ungodly and sinners.
And in this hour Christ is arising in men, starting with the Lord Jesus Christ and he is killing the carnal mind, which is raising the creation back up to the righteousness of the father, does anybody not understand that? So if Christ was killed at the beginning of time, and if his death caused the fall of the whole man, we are saying that the resurrection of the Christ must take place in a fallen man because everyone died. If one died for all brethren, that means all were dead. The whole creation was dead.
So we see the Christ the righteousness of the father in a man, manifested in the man Jesus of Nazareth, who is born of the seed of David, he had a physical body and a carnal mind after the seed of David, fallen, a fallen body and a fallen carnal mind, after his mother, but he also had the mind of his father, and the righteousness of the mind of his father overcame the fallen carnal mind, and the fallen body that the man Jesus had inherited from his mother and because he brought that sin in his mind into submission, and lived only out of the righteousness of his father, he was called, the man Jesus was called and became Jesus the Christ.
The Christ, the mind of the father was raised from the dead in the man Jesus, giving life to his soul and preservation to his body. Brethren if the mind in the man Jesus was not the righteousness of God, when the physical body of Jesus, which he inherited from his mother, which was capable of death, when that body was crucified, his mind was not already raised from the dead, the father would not have raised the whole man from the dead, why? Because the only reason the father raised him from the dead was because he found him righteous.
So righteousness was present in the man Jesus before his body was crucified. The resurrection of the dead brethren is in three stages, first Christ, the firstfruits in the man, then those who are his at his coming, the man, Christ in the man the firstfruits, then those that are his at his coming, the man or the men who will receive life because Christ has been raised by him, and then the end brethren, the ends of your earth, your physical body too. So we see that Christ died before the man Jesus was ever incarnated, and that Christ was raised from the dead before the man Jesus was crucified. And when the man Jesus was crucified, because his mind was already raised from the dead, and his soul had already received life, the father raised the whole creation from the dead, totally integrating the three elements of that man, his physical body, his carnal mind, and the mind of Christ, making of one new creature, the creation of God, the seed from which Christ will be sowed upon all of the kingdoms of humanity, and what are the kingdoms of humanity, each individual one of us is a kingdom.
Glory to God so that's what we're dealing with here, the teaching that the crucifixion of the man Jesus was as is said, and it killed him, but that the crucifixion of Christ is a totally different and separate event, which did not kill Christ but killed that which he was crucified to, which is the carnal mind that he inherited from his mother. When that man Jesus hung on the cross, his physical body was crucified and died, his physical body that he inherited from his mother, his carnal mind was crucified, and died, but Christ did not die, Christ crucified the carnal mind and because of the righteousness of Christ, the father raised the body and the whole man from the dead. Christ did not die on the cross, it was the presence of Christ in the man Jesus when he hung on the cross that the father honored by raising the whole man from the dead and if that Christ was not there, the father would have not raised the man from the dead.
Now brethren, let me remind you that when a mind dies, it does not cease to exist, it dies to what it is. The Christ died to righteousness, and it became what? It became death, it became death, the carnal mind is death. So if the righteous mind of Christ had been killed on the cross, it would have become sin, and the father would not have raised the man from the dead. Christ was crucified on the cross, he did not die on the cross. Everybody okay?
Okay, so we're going to do a few Scriptures in Gal. starting with chapter 2:16-21, "Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ, even we have believed in, that should be Christ Jesus, that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, and not by the works of the law, for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified". Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, I remind you of a recent Scripture, or a couple of recent Scriptures that we studied in the book of Romans chapter 5, I think it's verses 8 and 9, I may be wrong on the exact verses, where we found out that we are reconciled by the man Jesus of Nazareth's death, his death has reconciled us, we found out that that means that, well first of all let me review this, the man Jesus died on the cross, he gave up his soul life, he sacrificed his soul life so that he could be raised from the dead, become pure spirit and convert into a form by which he can seed all of us with his life, and because he died, and he's pouring out of his spirit, and he's inside of you in the form of what? His name changes to what when he gets inside of you? The Holy Spirit, that Holy Spirit reconciles us to God, so it's the death of the man Jesus that has resulted in our being reconciled to God. Is everybody okay? But we are justified by faith, and we're also told in Rom. 5, the Scripture says, we're justified by faith and it also says we're justified by his blood, and I want to remind you that the life of the flesh is in the blood, the life of this physical flesh is in our blood, and that the spiritual life of the glorified Lord Jesus Christ is in his spiritual blood, it's in his spiritual blood, and I want to tell you that when Christ is conceived in you, when the Holy Spirit does his work and joins with your human spirit and begins to resurrect her from the dead, Christ begins to be formed in you and his life is present in you, in a prenatal, in a spiritual prenatal stage, his life begins to be formed in you, in the form of his blood.
It's not the complete birth of his life in you, but his blood is present in you, and when you have conceived Christ and he begins to be formed in you, you are justified, you are reconciled by the Holy Spirit, you're permitted a relationship with the father, but your justification brethren, I remind you that, does anybody remember what justification means? Your justification, that word justification means to be righteous, to be made just. Your restoration from your fallen condition unto righteous standing with God is done by the indwelling Christ that is being formed in you. When Israel after the flesh brethren received the law, we're told that the law exposed sin or revealed sin, and without a revelation of sin, the trespass was not imputed. Brethren when the blood of Christ begins to be formed in you, he will begin to reveal the hidden sins of your heart.
The law that was given to Israel after the flesh, exposed the sin, exposed sin that is in the works of the flesh. It exposed murder, it exposed stealing, it exposed obvious sin, when the spiritual blood of Christ begins to form Christ in you, the hidden sins of your carnal mind that a lot of people don't even think are sin will be exposed for what they are, sin, that is keeping you unrighteous. Does expose your sin because he loves to torture you?
No, the father is fully intending to raise you from the dead, and no sin will enter into the kingdom. So the hidden sins of your heart must be exposed, it is an act of love. So we begin to be made just, or we begin to be justified, when the Holy Spirit who reconciles us to the father does his work, brings forth a conception, and the blood of Christ is now on the doorposts of our heart, and we are saved, we're also told in Romans 5, we are saved by his fully born life in us, his fully born life in us will save us, body soul and spirit, and each aspect of that salvation has its own name.
The salvation of the spirit is called redemption, the salvation of our soul is called adoption, and the salvation of our body is called preservation. And that in the hour that we enter into the third stage of resurrection, all three aspects of our being, spirit soul and body shall be joined in one, completely intermingled, and not only the three aspects of our being, but we will be completely grafted in to the tree which is our glorified Lord Jesus Christ and there will be no longer any separation between the three parts of us, or between us and our brethren, or between any one of us and the glorified Christ. Is everybody okay?
So we're in Gal.2:16, "Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law..", brethren there is nothing that you can do that will justify you in the eyes of God, just the blood of his life, only the blood of his life will bring you back to righteousness, and there's nothing you can do, "but by the faith of Jesus Christ, even we have believed..." Now the second Jesus Christ, if you look it up in the Greek it says Christ Jesus, and I remind you that the variation between Jesus Christ and Christ Jesus, Christ Jesus is saying, well Christ means anointing let me remind you of that, it means the anointing that was in the man Jesus. So let's take this a couple of words at a time. So we're not justified by the works of the law, but that which justifies us is the faith of Jesus Christ, and I remind you that the faith of Jesus Christ is the faith of God that comes through the mind of God in a man.
Our faith is as dirty rags, if our righteousness is as dirty rags, our faith is as dirty rags, we must get the faith of Jesus Christ and we cannot do it in our own strength, the way we get his faith is to get his blood, and when we get his blood and his blood starts to increase in us, he, his very life is our faith. This is not understood in the church. Brethren there is no way your faith is going to get you into the kingdom, you've got to get his faith growing inside of you.
So we're not justified by the works of the law, but we are justified by the faith that the man Jesus had, and that is the faith of Christ which was born in him. "..even we have believed in Christ Jesus." This is not too clear but what Paul is saying is that there's no justification by the works of the law, but those of us in whom Christ Jesus is being formed because of the faith of the man Jesus Christ, we have the blood of Christ in us, Christ Jesus because of the faith of the man Jesus. Is everybody okay, I know it's a little confusing, that's what he's saying, "...that we might be justified by the faith of Christ." We have believed, and let me comment on this, we have believed into Christ Jesus, again this believing brethren, it's not the carnal believing, which if I say to you this microphone is black, and you say I believe it I'm saved. No brethren, it's not that kind of a believing, we have to believe into Christ and what that means is that we believe with such an intensity and with such a conviction that a knitting together takes place.
Do you remember recently we had a Scripture that we should be knit together in the love of God? Brethren that part of us which is our true reality, our human spirit must knit together with the blood of Christ that is in us, because if our faith is in Christ Jesus, then we can only believe when we believe into Christ Jesus, we believe into him, our mind has an ability to reach out to vibrate forth and to join.
I hope you've all heard about soul ties. Our souls reach out and join, usually more often than not they're ungodly soul ties, than soul ties, but our souls have that ability to reach out and join with other spiritual aspects of people.
Well for us to, let me get you the exact expression here, "But we have believed in Christ Jesus", for us to believe in Christ Jesus we have to reach out to him with our mind, to such a degree that there is a knitting together. So first we get the Holy Spirit, then we get the blood of Jesus, which is the conception, and then we have to believe into that blood of Christ, after he's conceived in us, we must get inside of him, and when we're fully rooted inside of him, we will be able to leave our other husband which is Satan and the carnal mind completely, and live only out of Christ.
Okay so we're not justified by the works of the law, but we're justified by the faith of Jesus Christ, which because he had faith, has entered into our heart in the form of the Holy Spirit, and now that that's happened to us, Christ Jesus is being formed in us, we have his blood and now we have to believe into that blood, that we might be justified by the faith of Christ and that's Christ within us. "And not by the works of the law, for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified." Everybody okay?
Verse 17, "But if while we seek to be justified by Christ, we ourselves also are found sinners, is therefore Christ the minister of sin, God forbid. Now brethren what this is talking about is the reality that when Christ begins to be formed in you, he will expose sin in you, the hidden sins of your heart, and we've talked here about Christians, well meaning people doing the best they know how to do, doing good works for twenty, thirty, forty years, and then finally Christ begins to be formed in them and they find out that their works are worthless, they find sin being exposed in themselves, and for people in this category, you have two choices, you can go with God, ask him to help you set your pride aside, and confess these hidden sins of your heart and tell him that you want to go on to full stature, or you can deny that these sins that are being exposed are yours and you can accuse the son of God or the minister that's ministering and say your ministry has produced sin in me, I was perfect, I never had a problem in my forty years in the church, and now that you're supposedly ministering this new ministry to me, you're showing all this sin in me, well you must have put it in me. This ministry must not be of God, it's produced sin in me. The fruit of this ministry is sin, that's what he's saying. Let me read it for you again.
"But if while we seek to be justified by Christ", and how do we seek to be justified by Christ? We start to believe into Christ, we start to believe this doctrine of Christ and what is the doctrine of Christ, the doctrine of Christ is that he is a new mind that has been imparted to us, and that it is his full intention to crucify himself to our carnal mind, that we might be made perfect. As you start to work on it, as you start to study, as you start to believe, as you start to confess the hidden sins of your heart, there's going to be people if not your own mind that we ourselves also are found sinners, and therefore Christ must be a minister of sin. This ministry has produced sin in you. It's out there brethren, it's all through the church world.
All of these people that think they're standing because God hasn't touched them yet, and they look at people whose hidden sins are being exposed, they look at their pain, they look at the trouble in their life, they look at their weaknesses, and they say, "There must be something wrong with you, there must be something wrong in that ministry that you're in, your life is falling apart, where's your Cadillac?" Brethren there are many in this hour that think they're standing and they're about to find out that they are standing on the sand of their carnal mind.
So let me just go over this again, verse 17, "But if while we seek to be justified by Christ, we ourselves are found to be sinners, brethren we're sinners." I just got a newsletter, one of the major international Newsletters that preaches ultimate reconciliation, he said in bold letters, we are not sinners saved by Grace, that's the old man, you're the new man. Brethren I want to tell you something, you're not going to be the new man without going through this judgment and your mind control can pronounce it all you want, but in the hour that the judgment falls on you, you're going to find out who your foundation is. And you're going to find out that it's not Christ, but that it's the death of the fallen man. No matter how much you preach it and no matter how much you believe it, and no matter how much money ignorant prideful people send you to support your ministry, in the hour of the unveiling of Christ, I prophesy to you, unless the Lord grants you repentance, you shall surely be ashamed.
So this ministry of Christ brethren, it reveals that we are sinners, all you Pharisees out there, you're not justified by the works of the law, you're not justified by going to church, you're not justified by casting out demons, you're not justified by healing the sick, you're not justified by reading your Bible, dancing in the spirit, or feeding the poor. You are justified only by his life, and when his life begins to appear in you, it will expose your sin and reveal you not only to yourself brethren, but to the world, as a sinner, and you shall be a reproach to the nations, and the heathen shall laugh at you and mock you, and say, I thought you were a Christian, I see sin in you. I tell you the truth. Did you ever wonder how come the world thinks that Christians are suppose to be perfect? Did it ever occur to you that maybe pass generations of Christians have brought that upon themselves? Has it ever occurred to you that maybe the world thinks we should be perfect because the visible church pronounces itself perfect?
How does the visible church pronounce itself perfect? Brethren when you preach condemnation, you are declaring yourself perfect, you listen to what I have to say brethren, self righteousness produces condemnation. If I condemn you, I have pronounced my self righteous. I tell you the truth, any preacher in the pulpit or out who condemns the person that they're preaching to has pronounced themselves righteous, the whole world knows it's not true. Just the Pharisees in the church believe it.
So we are sinners brethren saved by grace and I remind you that the grace of God is Christ Jesus. The grace of God is the impartation to us of Christ Jesus, who is our righteousness who is our internalized ability to stop breaking the law, and when we stop breaking the law, the father will stop killing us, Satan is God's faithful servant who is killing every transgressor of the law, the penalty is death brethren. God has not lifted this penalty off of us, the penalty of sin is death, but his grace to us is the ability to stop breaking his law, and we must transfer from our fallen nature into the nature of his son, to escape the wrath of God.
Verse 18, "For if I build again the things which I destroyed, I make myself a transgressor." What has Paul destroyed that he could be building again? Brethren he has destroyed his carnal mind. If he is being justified by believing into Christ Jesus, he must be simultaneously killing his carnal mind, that's the way the ministry of Christ works. So Paul says, "How could this be, this lie that you're circulating, that this ministry of Christ builds sin in people? If I were to do that, he said if that were to be true, if I built again that which I have just worked so hard to destroy, I make myself a transgressor, and that Greek word translated "make" is establish, and I want to suggest to you that what Paul is saying is that if I do that, if Christ is being formed in me and the works that I do establish that which I destroy, if the works that I do build the carnal mind again, establish means to root in, to root down, the work of Christ is to kill the carnal mind.
Well if after the Christ in me is killed the carnal mind, if I build him again, that makes me a transgressor, and I want to suggest to you that the difference between sinner and transgressor is this, brethren if you are being victimized by your fallen nature, if you have been born of a fallen man and woman, and no matter how hard you try, you cannot cease from sin because your nature is sin, you are a sinner, but when the ability to stop sinning has been imparted to you, in the form of Christ Jesus and you willfully choose to sin, you are not a sinner by nature, but you are a transgressor of the law. And I suggest to you that Adam, as he began to think with the thoughts that eventually resulted in the fall was a transgressor, he had the ability to not sin, but he broke God's law.
So if Christ is being formed in you and you now have it within you the ability to not sin and you go out and sin without restraint, without confession, without repentance, if you justify your sin, if you say that's the way I am and it's tough, you have made yourself a transgressor of the law, and you are building your carnal mind. You are giving power to your carnal mind. Yes you could be overcome, but God requires you to at least confess it and say, "Father I'm powerless over this thing, but I confess that you say it's sin, but when you justify your sin, you are a transgressor of God's law and you are building wickedness in your own heart, and the Scripture says, you shall surely reap what you have sown, if you build wickedness, you will reap wickedness. God will raise up Satan in other people to be wicked to you. I tell you the truth brethren.
Verse 19, "For I through the law am dead to the law that I might live unto God." Now this sounds a little confusing but I want to suggest to you that Paul is speaking about two different laws. "For I through the law of Christ am dead to the law of sin and death, that I might live unto God." Paul is saying when I live out of Christ and when my authority is the law of Christ, the internalized spiritual authority of Christ, I therefore am dead to the law of sin and death which is where, the law of sin and death resides in the carnal mind brethren. And the reason he's doing this is that he might live unto God. He is, Paul is saying here that by an act of choice of his will, he is choosing to live out of Christ, and to be dead to the thoughts, the urges and the promptings of his carnal mind, how? Every time they rise up he kills them, he curses them, he rebukes them, he wounds them, and he wills to live out of his Christ, and the father honors his will, and if he didn't make it, if there was times that he didn't make it, and he fell down and he repented, and he tried again, if you are willing to fight, you cannot fail in Christ, you can get cast down, but if you stay with it, you must take the victory, if Christ is in you. Glory to God.
So now Paul is going to tell us in verse 20, he's going to tell us what I just told you, here it is in the Scripture. Paul says, "I am crucified with Christ..", that's how he's dead to the law of sin and death brethren, "I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live, yet not I but Christ liveth in me, and the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the son of God who loved me and gave himself for me." I just want to make a point and then I'm going to show you some fine points. Paul is crucified with Christ.
Now if Christ is separate from Paul, who is Paul? I want to suggest to you that Paul is the man that his mother gave birth to, he's the carnal man, so he's saying I Paul, who was born of my mother am crucified to the mind of Christ which was imparted to me while I was an adult man. And then he goes on to say, but even though, the Paul that he had been or the Saul that he had been for all of those years, I think he was thirty or more years old, even though that man died, he said he's still alive.
Brethren you know we talk a lot in slang in this country about losing our mind, this man really lost his mind. I want to tell you, you can't lose your mind and continue to exist, maybe your body would stay alive but you'd be a vegetable in a mental institution. I don't even know if your body could continue to live, if you truly lost your mind I don't think this body could live without a mind. He said that man that I was born as died, but I'm still alive, and the reason that I'm still alive is that I have a new mind, and that I'm living out of the mind of Christ, and it's Christ living in me that's keeping me alive. It was Christ in the man Jesus of Nazareth that caused the father to raise the man from the dead. It was the mind of Christ in the man Paul that kept him alive, when his carnal mind was killed through the crucifixion. And he says, "and Christ liveth in me and the life which I now live in the flesh, so he's clearly stating this is not some high spiritual life, this is a soulish life that he lives in the flesh, I live by the faith of the son of God." Now let me remind you that the son of God is our Lord Jesus Christ, the son of God is referring to our Lord Jesus Christ, and Paul says he lives by that faith, and I suggest to you he's saying to us that the resurrected glorified Lord Jesus Christ loved him and gave himself for him, and that's referring to the giving up of the soul life of the man Jesus of Nazareth. The mind of Christ did not die, but the flesh that he was living in, was given up, offered up, so that Christ could be glorified, so that the man Jesus could be glorified, so that Christ could be totally joined with him, and that he could be pouring out of his spirit upon all flesh especially Paul's flesh.
The man Jesus of Nazareth will never live again, the spiritual life of Christ is living again and will be fully resurrected again in many souls, and many bodies. I know this is a big problem in the church and a lot of people thinks it's blasphemy when they hear this, brethren the Lord never said, the Scripture never says, that the man Jesus is returning, Christ is returning. There's no Scripture that says the man Jesus of Nazareth that lived 2,000 years ago and died 2,000 years ago is going to appear on the earth again, and I declare to you brethren, don't shut off the tape, Jesus laid the foundation, when he said if you can receive it, the resurrected Elijah is that man John the Baptist, and that the same thing is happening in this hour, different flesh, the only reality is the spiritual life that's inside of that flesh.
Okay now I want to point out to you that the tense in the phrase "I am crucified with Christ" is not direct. First of all there is no Greek word translated with. The King James translators put that in, and second of all the form of the verb which would be called the first person singular, I am crucified, that is not as it appear in the Greek. The correct translation is what they call the passive voice, and it should be translated was crucified, there is no person, there is no, well I'm sorry, it should be translated was crucified. So this phrase, I am crucified with Christ, it really is saying, Christ was crucified.
See the King James make it sound like Paul was saying I am crucified, and I did preach on that, because he really was, his carnal personality, he was, but the reality of the Scripture says, Christ was crucified, nevertheless, I live. Is everybody okay, what I just taught you that was true, I just when along with this translation to make a point, but the Greek says, Christ was crucified, nevertheless I still live. Do you hear this? He says Christ was crucified, but I'm still alive, yet not I but Christ liveth in me. It can't be any clearer that that crucifixion killed his carnal mind. I don't see how it could be any clearer than that. And also we can see in it that it's saying Christ was crucified, nevertheless I live. Also Christ in the man Jesus was crucified, and that's why he lives. It actually could be taken both ways. If Christ wasn't crucified in the man Jesus, it could have never, he could never be in the condition that he's in.
So the crucifixion of Christ kills the carnal mind. Everybody okay. Verse 21, "I do not frustrate the grace of God, for if righteousness come by the law, then Christ is dead in vain." Paul is saying, I'm not going to frustrate the grace of God by living out of my carnal mind. Without confession of sin and repentance, now let me say it again brethren, nobody is perfect in this hour, we're all sinning every day, everyone of us, but if we confess our sins, if we are faithful to confess our sins, the father is faithful to forgive us, but if you're justifying your sin, you are not under the blood brethren, in the areas in which you justify your sin, Satan has a free reign on you, I tell you the truth.
Now you won't be destroyed if Christ is being formed in you, you won't be destroyed, but you will be severely chastened by Satan in other men, in the areas in which you justify your sin. I tell you the truth. And what is the purpose of this, the purpose of it is to break you to the point that you confess your sin and repent. If Christ is in you, you cannot continue, justification of one sin is a manifestation of pride, that is in direct opposition to the formation of Christ in you. The father will whip you until you yield. And he will use wicked men to do it.
So Paul says, he doesn't frustrate the grace of God, and remember we just spoke about the fact that the grace of God is Christ Jesus which is our ability to keep the law. Paul says, I won't frustrate Christ Jesus by willfully living out of my carnal mind or not resisting or confessing my sin, because if righteousness come by the law, then Christ is dead in vain. So he says the reason that he's not frustrating Christ and he's doing everything he can to not live out of his carnal mind, it's because he knows that there's no righteousness coming by the law, so therefore he better live out of Christ.
Let me just comment on this phrase which says, Christ is dead in vain, and that may sound like the Scripture saying Christ died for us again, we're back to that phrase again, so I would like to point out to you if you read the Scripture carefully, this word Christ is referring back to verse 20 where it talks about the son of God, I'll read the whole thing for you again. "And the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the son of God who loved me and gave himself for me, but if I frustrate the grace of God, which he gave me by dying for me, then Christ the man, Christ who is the Lord Jesus Christ, Jesus the Christ died for me, gave up his soul life for me in vain. Can anyone not see that. I know this is a little more difficult, I'll do it again.
Therefore if I live by the faith of the son of God, Paul says he's alive because of what the faith of the son of God did for him. What did the faith of the son of God do? The faith of the son of God resulted in Jesus' crucifixion and resurrection from the dead and return to pure spirit and the pouring out of that spirit upon Paul which gave him the grace of God which is Christ Jesus. So Paul says well if after all that, faith of the son of God, and the result in my life, if I don't use him to righteous, then Christ who is the son of God, who is our Lord Jesus Christ, died in vain. Is everybody okay?
Hallelujah, okay any questions on any of this? Anybody? Any questions on anything to do with this doctrine, this very important doctrine that the father is bringing down here? Why is it so important? It's so important because the preaching of this doctrine brethren is declaring the death of the carnal mind, it's declaring the resurrection of Christ in you, it's a very important doctrine. The carnal mind must be crucified. We have hidden in the corners of our fallen mind manifesting wherever it can a doctrine of man that says Christ can be defeated, that when Christ is crucified, when Christ is joined to the carnal mind Christ can be killed.
But my Bible says Christ having been raised from the dead now dieth no more. And the carnal minds of men have a memory in it, it's not a conscious memory, but it's a memory that goes back to the beginning of time, that knows that the immature Christ was killed. Well let me tell you something brethren, we're not dealing with the immature Christ today, we're dealing with the real thing brethren, we're dealing with the lion of the tribe of Judah brethren, we're dealing with the glorified Christ who's sitting on the white horse with a sword in his hand, and many crowns on his head, he's not playing anymore brethren, and the carnal mind is up against an enemy that is undefeatable, but for the believer who is not armed with the truth, he can be seduced to go along the path that will oppose God, and the Lord gave me a Scripture this past weekend, I think it was in the book of Kings, that clearly said to me brethren, if you are in the wrong place at the hour of his appearing because of your ignorance or because of your disobedience where the judgment unto destruction falls, if you're there, you're going to die to.
The hour of babyhood is over, you better get a hold of God and tell him that you want to be brought into obedience, and that you want to be where he wants you to be. Now don't worry that you can't hear from him. You tell him, Lord, I got this message, I'm doing all I could do, I'm on the altar before you, don't let me be killed with the sinners, get me in the right place, get me to safety, I want it and now you've got to do it, because I'm carnal and I'm weak and my ears are dull of hearing and my eyes are sleeping, but you said that you're my savior. Brethren you could wind up in the right place and not even know how you got there. You don't have to hear a voice brethren. How did you get here? All of you that are here that think that you don't hear from God. How do you think you wound up here? If you hear an audible voice, if you hear from him clearly, that's wonderful, but all he asks of you is your best, and then he kicks in.
Don't get your mind all clouded up with carnal thinking. He won't do anything in your own strength, even those of us that hear from God cannot enter in by our own strength. Your faith must be in God brethren. He wants you to have an honest and a sincere heart towards him, and he wants you to be willing to give up anything and everything believing that he will provide your basic human needs, he wants a heart that's turned towards him brethren and he's going to do it. Stop trying to control your salvation, you're going to kill yourself, just do the best you know how to do. Believe me he wants to appear in you in full stature more than you want it. Hallelujah. Any questions? Anybody? Okay we've got a question here.
COMMENT: You're saying a double minded man is unstable in all his ways, now that can't be referring to the mind of Christ and the carnal mind in a man, that has to be referring only to the carnal mind, because it's saying unstable in all his ways.
PASTOR VITALE: Actually it's referring to the true reality of the man whose human spirit has produced two offspring, one legitimate and illegitimate. We are our human spirit, that is our reality, he has two children, the carnal mind and the Christ, and she's confused as to which way she's going.
COMMENT: If we operate sometimes in the mind of Christ, how could the Scripture say unstable in all our ways?
PASTOR VITALE: Well it's not that Christ is unstable, what's unstable is that we go back and forth, that's what's unstable. We don't what it takes to abide in Christ, we keep bouncing out, now remember the mind in the man is separate from the man.
The man is unstable, because we keep bouncing back and forth between the two minds, it's not Christ that's unstable the man is unstable.
COMMENT: I was thinking it was the direction coming from either mind.
PASTOR VITALE: No, no that man is unstable, the man is unstable. We must ask the Lord to help us to be single minded towards Christ, but you have to know you're going to fall out of it, it's impossible to abide in Christ until he rescues us.
COMMENT: Jesus said that he's the door, and he opens and he closes, is this what he means about coming, how can I put it into words, receiving the mind of Christ, coming to the full stature of Christ?
PASTOR VITALE: Well I don't know exactly how to answer your question, but he is the door into the realm of his spirit which is called life, he is the only way to achieve or attain life, and the door opens and closes because we enter in in stages, and we have to walk through when he opens and the only way we're going to walk through when he opens is to fully so prepared at the moment of the opening that we literally float through, that's the way I describe it. I describe it as a bunch of us as helium filled balloons just hanging on that ceiling waiting for the roof to come off the house, and when the roof comes off the house, you just go through. And I remind you of the ten virgins, five with which had oil and five didn't. Now they were all virgins, what does that mean? They were cleansed from their sin with their carnal mind. Virgins not fornicating, no spiritual adultery with their carnal mind, but neither had they entered into a spiritual union with Christ.
To have oil in your lamp means that Christ is in you. Let me say that again. The fact that they're virgins means that they're no longer fornicating or committing adultery with their carnal mind, they'd be one. Well how can I say that? Well they're not having sex with anybody if they're virgins right? But the five that have oil means that Christ is in them. Now remember Christ is being formed in us and when he's fully formed in us, he's going to marry our soul. So he can be in us without us having sexual union with him. Christ can be in us without his having sexual union with us. So the virgins with oil are those that have rejected adultery with the carnal mind, and have Christ but have not married him yet, and the virgins without oil are those who have rejected sin, but in whom Christ is not being born. Brethren you cannot marry Christ if you don't have Christ. He's not coming from the sky, he's got to be inside of you, and if he hasn't been formed and grown up inside of you, when the door opens brethren you're not going to have any oil. And the Scripture clearly states that getting this oil is not something that you can do overnight, because by the time the oil less virgins came back, it was to late. Brethren we've been laboring here for years, this thing doesn't happen overnight.
COMMENT: When someone receives the Holy Spirit, that's the promise of Christ being formed in them, am I right.
PASTOR VITALE: Yes, amen.
COMMENT: Now I understand Christ can be aborted from someone.
PASTOR VITALE: Yes.
COMMENT: How can a promise of God be hindered in any manner?
PASTOR VITALE: Okay, because the promise is to the creation, remember we are one living soul, one plant, many leaves, and the promise of salvation is to the creation, is to the soul, is to the man. God never said there won't be a bunch leaves that won't die, he never said that, and if fact there's going to be a lot of leaves that are going to die, that have already died. Brethren look at your natural tree, the leaves that fall off the tree season, never rise again, the root abides, the trunk abides, the branches abide, even the twigs abide, the leaves fall off every season and they never rise again, the tree puts out new leaves.
COMMENT: When Christ has been formed in someone, it's definitely up to them to walk with the spirit of God, work out their salvation with fear and trembling right?
PASTOR VITALE: Yes.
COMMENT: That part depends upon them, raises what God has given to them, but they have to cooperate fully with it, is that what it is?
PASTOR VITALE: Right and if you do the best that you can, you should have no fear of aborting. To my knowledge, I have seen two people abort, and both of those people have been extremely rebellious about what God is doing in their life, and unwilling to pay the price, and unwilling to confess their sins, one woman was unwilling to confess her sins and the other woman was unwilling to pay the price, and I've seen two people abort.
Now let me just say one thing, nobody should be walking in fear brethren, fear is never of God. If you are concerned that your walk isn't strong enough and you're concerned about aborting, go before the father, he's so faithful, and tell him about your fear and ask him to help you in your weaknesses, but to walk in fear is never of God.
COMMENT: I don't understand what you said earlier, I thought you said that to be sustained in this world system you have to be joined to somebody, either the carnal mind or the mind of Christ, and then you said that the virgins are not joined to anybody, so how could they exist?
PASTOR VITALE: I said they weren't committing adultery, I didn't say they weren't joined.
COMMENT: You said that Eve is having sex with the carnal mind, yeah that's incest but she does that, that's how she's appearing in this world system. If she's not doing that she's not appearing. I don't understand you said the virgins aren't doing that.
PASTOR VITALE: That's a good question, I don't know the answer, the only thing that comes to me right now, is that that was clearly a parable, clearly a parable, which means Jesus was telling a story to make a point, and the point that he was making was that it's not enough to stop sinning, you've got to get Christ, and that's the only answer that comes to me now, it was a parable, an example, an illustration. Okay.
SHEILA'S ANSWER AT THE TIME OF POSTING THIS MESSAGE: All human beings must be joined to the carnal mind to appear in this fallen world, which is a visible expression of the carnal mind. We avoid spiritual adultery while we are still joined to the carnal mind by agreeing with and utilizing the strength that Christ, our New Man, gives us, to resist, capture and cast down every thought generated by the carnal mind (2 Cor. 10:5). This spiritual principle is demonstrated in Rev. 20:1-3 to those who understand the secret of the carnal mind, i.e., that the dragon, that old serpent, the Devil and Satan represent the fallen carnal mind of mortal man.
It's true that you can't stop sinning without Christ.
I think the point was that you have to have, see we have a whole church world that is just concentrating on the religious work of stopping sinning, they're trying to control their flesh to stop doing it, and Jesus' point was, even if you could do it, even if you could be a virgin, you're still not going to enter in without Christ. Okay praise God.
COMMENT: When you were talking about the virgin, it made me think of the story I heard about a wife who said, I love my husband from the waist up, she didn't want to get involved in sexual union and she didn't want to have children, she just wanted the companionship, she thus far and no further.
PASTOR VITALE: Well that's true, I know we even have a tape on that somewhere in the revelation series. I remember preaching that message, it was really a hot message, and the point the Lord was pressing home was that this living soul does not want to have sex with her true husband and she does not want to bear his child. And we've got to do it, why? Because this sexual union is painful. As Christ presses into us and we press into him, it could be likened unto a maidens wedding night, it can be very painful only it's not over in five minutes, this pain is going on for a long time and it's very painful, and the church doesn't want the pain, I don't want it either, but I just, I have such a call on my life, I know that I don't have any choice, and I thank God for that grace, but they're going to have to do it because there's a bride of Christ and the church is his bride, and we are going to have to join in him with that marital union and they are going to have to bear his child, and there is going to be a forced union, and that's not a popular statement, but I'll tell you the truth, and if you think you weren't forced, you know you don't even know what you're talking about, because I want to tell you that if my life didn't go the way my life, I've had a terrible life, and if I didn't have the kind of life that I had, I guess I wouldn't be joining with him either. What he does is he wrecks your life. He wrecks your life to such a degree that he's better than your life, that you run towards him because life in this world is so horrible that you know the need the comfort in whatever else he's giving you whatever your experience is. I don't know how anyone could live in this world without an intense union with Christ, but apparently their experience, the experience of the people who do have not been my experience.
I know that there isn't anything I wouldn't give up not to lose him, because I know what my life has been like, and so I'm entering in and with all of the pain, I'm still pressing into the kingdom. So what does that mean brethren? It means judgment has to fall, he's going wreck your life, he's going to wreck your life and depending on each individual, depending on what it's going to take in your life for you to turn to him, that's what he's going to do. Now the more stubborn you are and the more strong willed you are and the more strong headed you are, the more he's going to have to crush you. So don't look at somebody and say well my life is so much harder than their life, maybe they're a coward, and they just got touched once and they said alright Lord I'm yours, and maybe you're a strong willed person that he had to literally chop into pieces, strip you of everything.
Brethren he took everything from me, I'm a very strong willed person, he took everything and he took my whole life from me. I tell you the truth. Now maybe that won't be necessary for you, but don't worry about it, but, now look don't worry about it, but if you look at your life, if you evaluate your life and you can honestly say, Father I have given my whole life to you, and this is what you're doing for me, you're ruining my life? You're taking everything from me that is cherished in this world, what kind of a recompense is that?
If that's you in that category, and you honestly have been serving God all of these years, brethren he's taking you unto himself, because you would never give this stuff up of your own accord, you'd never give it up, you'd take it over him and he knows it. So he's ripped it out of your life, he's killed all your opportunities. The Lord killed my career, if I ever had to go get a job now, I'd be like starting from scratch, he has wrecked my career, I have nothing to go back to. So if he's wrecked your hopes, if he's wrecked your flesh, if he's wrecked your mind, and now he's bringing forth life out of the death of your prior existence, he's done it because he knows you better than you know yourself and he knows that nothing less than what he has done to you will turn you to him.
So if you are truly serving God in your heart and you know whether you are or not, and it looks to you like Satan's got the best of you, I want to encourage you to not believe this lie, because your enemy is not Satan brethren, your enemy is the Lord Jesus Christ, who is apprehending you for a life in his spirit and you don't want to go. And your enemy is not your preacher, or any other human being, but your enemy is God, because you are opposing his will in your life.
So don't push against the pricks brethren, ask him to help you, it's painful no matter which way you turn, it's painful, but I believe that it could be quicker or slower or more painful or more gentle, I believe that with all my heart.
COMMENT: While you were speaking I was thinking of the song, I don't want to grow up, and I guess the Lord is wooing many, drawing them, and they're constantly refusing him.
PASTOR VITALE: Yeah, they won't come. I had a dream a couple of years, ago, maybe three or four years ago, four years ago, and I was walking down the street, and saw this car on the street, and it was packed six people you know maximum people in the car, and it was being driven by a man who was in the ministry at the time, and I walked up to the car and I looked through the windshield, and I was calling them, and the driver looked me right in the eye gunned the engine and took off screeching down the street, and I was standing on the sidewalk screaming on the top of my lungs, come back, come back, and they drove, and I knew in the dream I typified Christ, and they drove as fast and as far away from him as they could get, and that's all of us. I don't take any credit for being where I am, he has forced me here, he has driven me here.
And Jesus was led of the spirit into the wilderness, he has driven me into this wilderness, which is already flowering, I mean I had years in the wilderness, I mean talk about loneliness and isolation, I don't even want to remember it, and it's a party now compared to what it was. So Satan hasn't done this to you brethren. Or yes Satan has done it to you at the express instructions of the father. See it's unfortunate that this teaching isn't in the church, because we have a whole church full of broken hearted people that think the Lord has failed them, whose faith is being shaken because God is not doing what their carnal brain thinks he's suppose to be doing. Brethren is not subject to mind control.
Fallen preachers can preach anything you want, you messengers of Satan, and your own carnal minds can believe anything you want, you will not modify the Lord Jesus Christ, you can call him wicked, he's still what he is, you can call him evil, you can call him unrighteous, you can call him faithless, but he still wants you and he's still gonna break your bones to do whatever he has to do to get you. The church doesn't preach the truth brethren. Look this is a hard walk no matter how you twist it, but it's much harder when you hear a lie and you think that God is personally failed you.
I went through that three years ago, it was devastating, when I wound up in the hospital for more than three months, I had believed God always heals you supernaturally, I thought he turned me over, it was terrible. I didn't understand that God gives you many experiences and that there are seasons. I know that many people that received supernatural healing ten, fifteen years ago, that are in the hospital today. God just doesn't seem to be doing today what he was doing fifteen years ago. God comes in waves, his purposes comes in waves, no one taught me that, or if it was preached to me, it never got into my brain. Well I'll tell one way to avoid this kind of illusion, and that's to burn it into your brain that God is faithful, he is perfect, he is righteous, he is incapable of failing you, and if you think he's failing you, there is something wrong with your thinking.
So the first thing you have to do is ask the Lord if he isn't letting this come upon you to produce a correction in your thinking, are you out of order, have you made a mistake, but it's not him, it's you brethren, we're the sinners, he's not the sinner, and everything that's happening to us, we deserve, every unpleasant thing that's happening to us is a judgment for sin, if you are not a sinner it would not be happening you or it wouldn't be affecting you the way it's effecting you. God is righteous. Watch it brethren, that's a spirit of pride, that says you don't deserve this, better repent fast. Okay anybody else.
Hallelujah.
