Part 4 of 5 Parts
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We are going to do a Part 3 to “The Temptation.” And we’ll be concentrating on Luke chapter 4, verse 1 tonight.
Glory to God. We’re going to do something unusual tonight. I’m going to read you the recap from Matthew chapter 4, verses 1 through 4. And then we’re going to do a comparative study. The account of the temptation appears in three of the gospels. It appears in Matthew chapter 4. It appears in Luke chapter 4, and it appears in Mark chapter 1.
And I just have one verse for you tonight: Mark 4:1, Matthew 4:1 and -- I’m sorry -- Luke 4:1, Matthew 4:1 and Mark 1:12. There is only one verse in Mark referring to the temptation. And it’s very, very -- God gave me a very interesting word for you.
Let me just not assume that you know anything about the harmony of the gospels. Let me make a comment on it. When any of us -- read the same account repeated in the Scripture the account of Jesus’ temptation in the wilderness, where He overcame Satan in His mind and refused to sin, this appears in three different gospels. The Lord is not frivolous, and it’s not repeated just because of inefficiency or inaccuracy.
Scholars for centuries have been doing what they call comparative studies of the gospel. They’ll take a common story, like the story of the [UNINTELLIGIBLE], anything that’s a well-known scriptural story. And they’ll compare it the way it’s written in each of the -- in however many gospels it’s written in.
There are four gospels. Sometimes the account is written in one. It’s rarely written in one; sometimes it appears in two, three or four gospels. And you’ll find that there’s always a little bit of difference from gospel to gospel. And sometimes just one word can radically change the meaning.
And the only other time we ever did anything like this was when we did Daniel chapter 7. And first we studied the first section of the chapter, which was the story of the beasts. And then the second half of Daniel chapter 7 -- we’re told -- is the interpretation of Daniel’s vision. And it sounds like Daniel is just repeating himself, but as we looked up all of the words in the Hebrew, we found out that it wasn’t just a repetition of the verse. There was one other piece of information added, which really radically changed our understanding.
So tonight we’re comparing verse 1 of the account of the temptation in the two gospels and the only verse that appears in the gospel of Mark. And if the Lord lets me continue in future meetings, we’ll do a comparative study of verse 2, 3 and 4, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.
OK, does anybody not know what I’m talking about? Everybody knows what I’m talking about? OK, good. That was a joke; that was a joke. I have a joking spirit on me these last couple of days. Praise the Lord.
[INAUDIBLE]
Can’t imagine. Cannot imagine.
Recap Matthew Chapter 4, verses 1 to 4, “Then Satan caught Jesus up into the soul realm for a spiritual battle with the Devil,
“Who Satan was hoping would kill the newly born mind of Christ and sacrifice Him to Satan.
“And the Devil aggressively” -- well, let me stop there.
Let me make a comment on this. What is this concept of sacrificing -- of Satan sacrificing Christ -- of the carnal mind sacrificing Christ to Satan? This is a very important concept that the Lord is dealing with powerfully right now. And He’s been teaching us that human beings sacrifice each other all the day long. We sacrifice each other. What does that mean? It means that if there is any kind of a problem or a conflict that we are responsible for and we are not willing to admit our contribution to the problem -- therefore the way we deal with it is to blame the other person. The way God sees it is that we have sacrificed them so that we can maintain our self-righteous image. Does anybody not know what we’re talking about?
OK, so the way the Scripture is putting it right here is that the carnal mind sacrifices Christ. How are we going to make this real to us? We’ve got to make these Scriptures real to us. We’ve got to see them functioning in our everyday life. If someone -- if a believer that’s in a carnal mind has a conflict with a believer who’s manifesting Christ and the believer whose mind is carnal does not want to confess that they -- well, that they were carnal -- if they’re carnal, that means that their mind was sin.
You see if two believers are manifesting the mind of Christ, there will be no division. They will be in one min- -- of one mind and one accord. So if you have two believers and there’s any kind of a conflict, we must know that at least one person -- possibly two, but at least one person -- is in the carnal mind. Now it’s possible for two, five, or 15 people to all be in the carnal mind and nobody agreeing because the carnal mind is what? Anybody?
[INAUDIBLE]
Divided, divided. The carnal mind is divided, but Christ is not divided. And my Bible tells me that it’s possible and that I will see the day where we can have a meeting like this or a meeting of 10,000 with everybody of one mind and one accord. And there’s only one way that that’s going to happen. It’s going to happen because Christ will be formed in every individual, and He will be thinking through them and for them. And they will all think the same thing.
Now that doesn’t mean that they’re going to be robots. This is not the same thing as tyranny, which opposes [sic] one’s mind on someone else. It’s not the same thing as mind-control, which batters your mind until you come into agreement.
This will be an agreement that will come forth because everybody will have the mind of God. It will be a natural occurrence. It’s something that I’ve been preaching here for a long time now.
We cannot impose the law from the outside. You cannot -- well, you can do it, but I don’t think it’s wise to say to a new believer that’s just come into the church, look, you must give up everything you’re doing right now. You must burn your cigarettes. You must burn your -- whatever else, you know, you think -- and I’m not talking about [?outrights?]. [?I mean?], you give up what you could give up as fast as you could give it up.
It’s not doing you any good if s- -- if I’m imposing a law upon you from the outside and saying, now, you must give it up. And you’re in torment every day and sneaking around the corners, trying to get a cigarette. You’ve got to be convicted that this activity -- whatever it is in your life: drugs, alcohol, anything -- if you impose it as a law from the outside, it will never survive. It will be for a season: a week, two weeks, two months, three months. And you’ll go right back doing it again. It doesn’t work forever. The true deliverance comes when Christ gets inside of you and changes your heart so that you no longer need this thing or crave this thing. Jesus works from the inside out.
So we’re talking about sacrificing each other. So when a believer who’s in the mind of Christ has a conflict with a believer who’s not in the mind of Christ and the believer who is not in the mind of Christ insists that they are in the mind of Christ and the one that’s in the mind of Christ is not, the way the Scripture describes it is that you have sacrificed the righteous mind of Christ in that person so that you can continue to appear righteous. And this is what’s happening in the hour of temptation.
Does anybody not know what I’m talking about? Does anybody not understand this? That if you do something wrong, if you walk away with my shoes and you let someone else get blamed for it and you stand by, knowing that they’re getting blamed for something that you did and you let it happen, you have sacrificed them so that your unrighteousness can remain hidden? Does anyone not know -- do you know what I’m talking about? OK. Anybody not know what I’m talking about?
That’s not a small thing. It’s a manifestation of pride. God absolutely hates it. And we see what exists on a small level, amongst human beings, and it goes on all the time. Parents blame their children. Husbands blame their wives. Wives blame their husbands.
You know, the first time I came up against it, it really s- -- in the ministry, I was absolutely amazed. We had this married couple in the ministry, and this woman did something to do with the music ministry. She did something right in front of me, and I asked her not to do it. And she said, “Oh, I didn’t do it. My husband did it.” And she completely faked me out, you know, because my mind -- even when I was in the world, I have my own weaknesses, but that’s not one of my weaknesses. I don’t usually do that. I walked away saying, gee, I could have sworn she did it.
And then as the days went by, I realized that every time she was in any danger of having done something wrong, she just blamed her husband. It just rolled off her tongue. And guess what? He did the same thing. So when you finally got to know these people, you realized that something was really wrong. Nobody -- well, what was wrong? Neither one of them was facing up to whatever they were doing.
And if you don’t face up to it, you can’t solve the problem. I’m not talking about robbing a bank of $10 million. I’m talking about some little thing that all you have to do is say, yeah, I did it. I’m sorry, and I’ll -- you know, I’ll try not to do it again. I’m talking about some little thing. And they spent their whole lives saying it was the other guy. God doesn’t like it -- doesn’t like it. And for any Pharisee that’s listening to this message, there is definitely degrees of sin. There is degrees -- or there are degrees of sin. Jesus clearly stated that some sins will receive few stripes, and other sins will refu- -- will receive the greater stripes. There is a degree of sin.
Now I’m not talking about the Roman Catholic view of it, but there is a true degree of sin that exists in the spirit. It’s not the same thing if you get your back up against the wall, and you -- like, I saw somebody once make a mistake on the photocopy machine in an office. And they worked for this really difficult man, who was persec- -- would -- they knew would persecute them over such a mistake, and they lied. They said, no, I didn’t make that copy. I’m sorry; the response to that sin is not the same as you murdering somebody. It just isn’t. And if you think it is, you’re being naïve because it’s not true, and you’re deceived. It’s not true.
God is not mocked. Every sin shall have its what? Does anybody know?
Just recompense.
Just recompense. Every sin shall have its just recompense, and you don’t get the same recompense for lying about making the photocopy as you do for killing somebody and all the other degrees in between. Praise God.
So we see in the account of the temptation, a conflict going on in the mind of the man Jesus of Nazareth. He has two minds: He has a carnal mind, and He has a Christ mind. And both of them are trying to sacrifice the other mind. Is this amazing? The carnal mind wants to sacrifice Christ as he already had done at the beginning of time. And Christ wanted to sacrifice the carnal mind.
The church world calls this Armageddon, and it shall go on in the mind of every human being eventually. I call it the war of the two minds. And you cannot start to wage this war until you could see the two minds in your mind. You have to be able to distinguish between Christ and the carnal mind or there’s no way you’re going to wage this war. And as we found out in the previous messages on this series, Satan twisted the words of the Scripture when he spoke to the Christ mind in Jesus.
You have to be able to tell who’s talking to you. And I don’t put any burden on anybody here. The wa- -- when I say to you, you have to, what I mean is: Start banging on God’s door and saying, Lord, I’ve got a revelation that if I can’t tell the difference between the carnal mind and the Christ mind in my own mind, I got a revelation that I’ve got one real problem.
Don’t try to do it yourself; you can’t do it yourself. You can’t make yourself righteous. You can’t give yourself an ability to discern between the two minds. Spiritual ability, spiritual strength, spiritual discernment, spiritual gifts is all in Christ. The only thing that we have power to do is to lay hold of that which He has given us and use it against our carnal mind.
But He must give us the weapon. He must give us the strength. He must give us the discernment. He must even put the will in our heart, and then we must do. You have to get your weapon. Ezekiel 9 talks about six men with slaughter weapons in their hands. Brethren, we must kill our carnal minds, and you must see him before you kill him. Praise the Lord.
So everybody understands what was happening here in the temptation. The man Jesus of Nazareth had a spiritual experience right after His water baptism. There was a conflict of the carnal mind, which He inherited from His mother, which was in full stature, and the Christ mind, which was caught up to full stature at the time of His water baptism.
The conflict ensued the second that the Christ mind stood up. It might even have occurred while He was still in the water. I haven’t found any Scripture yet that would indicate to me exactly whether it happened while He was still in the water or how far after that. But I don’t think there was any time wasted, and it might very well have occurred while He was still in the water.
So let us continue. We are reading the recap of Matthew 4, verses 1 through 4. “Then Satan caught Jesus up into the soul realm for a spiritual battle with the Devil,
“Who Satan was hoping would kill the newly born mind of Christ and sacrifice him to Satan.
“And the Devil aggressively approached Jesus, saying, If you’re really the Son of God, let’s see you bring the many members of the living soul into spiritual maturity in their present, sin-filled condition.
“But Jesus, having completely forsaken His carnal needs and desires and craving dominion over the Devil, answered his carnal mind, saying, Man cannot live in a soul which is in your image, but he can live in a soul which is in the image of Christ.”
And please note that your carnal mind will always be tempting you to use the power of God for your own purposes. It is not the will of God that this soul should be brought into a condition of immortality in their sin-filled condition because that would truly be eternal torment. That is not the will of God.
We’re going to work now with Matthew 4 -- chapter -- well, I’m just going to read you the King James translation of Matthew 4, verse 1. “Then was Jesus led” -- and that -- this is what you have on your papers. You have the three verses spelled out. “Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the Devil.” Luke 4:1 says, “And Jesus being full of the Holy Ghost returned from Jordan.” That was all extra, and now it says something that sounds pretty much like Matthew 4:1. “And [He] was led by the Spirit into the wilderness.” Matthew 4:1, “Jesus was led up of the Spirit into the wilderness.” Luke 4:1, “And [He] was led by the Spirit into the wilderness.” Mark 1:12 says, “And immediately the spirit driveth him into the wilderness.”
And I’m suggesting to you that ver- -- that Matthew 4:1 is talking about Satan catching the carnal mind of the man Jesus up. What does that mean: catching it up? Manifesting. Satan manifested in the carnal mind of the man Jesus. Luke 4:1 talks about Christ or the Father manifesting through the Christ, who was just caught up to full stature in the man Jesus.
It was showdown at the OK Corral. You cannot have two fully manifested minds at one point in your mind. I’ve been telling you here for a while now that the carnal mind is in full stature. If you are existing in this world, the carnal mind is in full stature. The second the Christ mind of Jesus appeared in full stature, there was a war.
Your natural example is: If you have a piece of property with a pit bull watching it -- a pit bull guarding your property -- and all of a sudden, another pit bull appears on the property, there is a moment that you have two fully mature, viciously trained pit bulls standing on your property. But after the battle’s over, there’s only going to be one.
So there is a period of time that they were both present, and this is what happened. This is what the temptation is all about. Christ stood up in Satan’s territory, and Satan was right there, as I put it, tapping him on the shoulder. He didn’t waste one second. It was outright war from the second that it happened, and I believe the Lord is telling me it did happen while He was still in the water. Not only was it outright war the second that it happened, Satan saw it happening, and it was as if someone was being raised up out of a pit. Oh, there’s a Scripture for it. “And the dragon stood by the woman, waiting to devour her child the moment he was born.”
So we’re going to do verse 1 of Luke chapter 4, and then I’ll just point out some of the comparisons to you. Well, let me give you the third comment on Mark 1:12. I said Matthew’s talking about Satan manifesting in the carnal mind. Luke is talking about the Father manifesting through His Christ. And Mark 1:12 is telling us we’ll find out that the Spirit of God invaded the enemy territory, and I daresay He took it. Everybody following me?
Matthew and Luke is [sic] talking about the preparation for this war. It’s talking about the condition of the two sides. What two sides? Satan and his carnal mind, Jehovah and the Christ. They’re both preparing for battle, and we have information about both sides, but Mark says the Spirit of God invaded the soul realm. The Spirit of God invaded this world system and utterly challenged and defeated the prince of the power of the air in the man Jesus of Nazareth.
And because this happened in the man Jesus of Nazareth, every human being now has the opportunity or the weapon to achieve the same thing in their mind. Jesus didn’t do it for you. Jesus’ sacrifice and His work on the cross provided the weapon for you that would make it possible. Everybody OK?
We have a whole church world that can’t figure out how come we’re still in such desperate condition, so they fantasized that we’re going to get made well after this body dies, but it’s not true. You’ve got to lay hold of your spiritual weapon, people, and you’ve got to cut that thing out of your heart because it’s a malignant cancer that’s killing you. And I don’t care how good your life looks. Even if you live an excellent lifetime, this death that we abide in must affli- -- affect your children and your offspring. Hallelujah.
“And immediately the Spirit driveth him into the wilderness.” And immediately the Spirit drove himself into the spiritual realm of the soul. Hallelujah.
OK. Please note that Luke 4:1 gives us additional information in the first phrase of the verse. “And Jesus being full of the Holy Ghost returned from Jordan.” So let’s see what Luke 4:1 means. “And Jesus being full of the Holy Ghost returned from Jordan, and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness.”
The word full is Strong’s 4134, and it means complete, lacking nothing or perfect. And we know that standing up in full stature is the perfection or the completion of our what? Anybody? Of our what? What’s being perfected in this hour?
[INAUDIBLE]
Our spirit, our spirit. Our spirit is becoming the mind of Christ. Our spirit is the carnal mind, but it’s being -- it’s becoming -- it’s being delivered from the carnal mind and being perfected into Christ, OK? OK. Glory to God.
The word returned, “And Jesus being full of the Holy Ghost returned from Jordan” -- the word returned is Strong’s 5290, and it means to turn back. To turn back from Jordan, that doesn’t make much sense to me. And the Greek word translated Jordan is Strong’s 2446, and it means flowing down.
So [?in?] the information I’m about to share with you now, I took from the Hebrew lexicon because the river Jordan appears both in the Hebrew and in the Greek. And it’s not at all uncommon to find more information under the Hebrew references than under the Greek. The word Jordan means to flow down, to flow down. And we know that anything spiritual is going up. It’s ascending. And that which is going down is asc- -- is descending into the soul realm. That which goes up -- that which is going towards the spirit is ascending, and that which is going down is going down into the soul realm. Everybody OK?
Now the river Jordan in the natural -- or let me say this to you: Whenever we work with names of n- -- of geographical places, we need to know that if we’re trying to find out what the spiritual symbol of it is, we need to know that God is using both the natural truths about it and some spiritual truths about it. And then we also have to look for grammatical influences, and I’ll expound on that a little more in a minute.
The river Jordan exists. It exists in the Middle East right now, and it -- and the name Jordan means to flow down. The natural river Jordan empties out into the Dead Sea, which is in Israel. Every river has a sea that it enters out into. It’s called an outlet. And you could have several rivers, and they could all empty out into the same sea. And once the ri- -- if you have six different rivers and they all empty into one sea, once they empty into that sea, there’s no telling the difference between the water, which came from any of the individual rivers.
So we have the river Jordan emptying into the Dead Sea. The Dead Sea is a sea that has died. How does a sea die? I saw the Dead Sea. I was in Israel, and I saw it. It’s an awesome experience. Pretty much all of the water has evaporated, and all that’s left is minerals because sea water is made up of water and minerals. So it’s a gigantic area -- a sea is a large body -- but there’s almost no water in it. It’s very thick. You could go wading in it. Some people go in for their health. They believe the minerals will help them.
So we see that the river Jordan is talking about descending, and it’s a descent that ends up in complete death. And most people that have studied the Bible for any length of time know that Jordan typifies death. When the Scripture talks about crossing over Jordan, it means crossing over to the other side of death. If this world is death, then crossing over Jordan means entering into life. Everybody OK? Is everybody OK? OK.
I would like to point out some grammatical pointers to you though. I did a study in Strong’s concordance on all of the entries that talk about Jordan because what struck me odd was that this Scripture, Luke 4:1, does not say the river Jordan. Doesn’t say the river Jordan; it just says Jordan. And if you read -- you can back up a couple of verses and go a couple of verses forward. It doesn’t say anything at all about water. It doesn’t say anything at all about a river. It doesn’t say anything at all about a sea.
And that was what got me suspicious, so I looked up -- at every entry in Strong’s concordance. And what I found was, with five exceptions -- four in the Old Testament and one in the New Testament -- every time the Scripture mentions Jordan, the word is modified by some word that would indicate it’s the natural river Jordan. Either it says the side of Jordan or go over Jordan or in the verse before or the verse after, it’s talking about the river Jordan or the water of the Jordan or it’s obvious in some way that the Scripture’s talking about the natural river Jordan. It’s talking about water. There are indications that it’s talking about water. But in five references -- four in the Old Testament, and the only one in the New is Luke 4, verse 1 -- I find a spiritual Jordan.
Let me give you the examples. In the Old Testament, the references are Jeremiah 12:5, Jeremiah 49:19, Jeremiah 50:44, Zechariah 11:3. And in each of these four Scriptures, the Hebrew word is Strong’s 1347. This word in the King James is translated swelling. It talks about the swelling of the Jordan. And if you don’t check it out, you would be inclined to say, well, the swelling of the Jordan: doesn’t that mean water? Doesn’t that mean the banks are overflowing?
But if you check out those Scriptures, you’ll find out that this word -- or if you check out this word, Strong’s 1347, it’s really not speaking about water at all. And the word is translated pride or arrogance. This word that’s translated the swelling of the Jordan, Strong’s -- Gesenius says that the word means pride or arrogance and that the word can also mean splendor or glory.
And those of us that have been studying here for a while may remember that glory is speaking about the Spirit of God in the soul realm. And we found out in particular, in our study of the Book of Habakkuk, that there is a glory of Satan’s spirit. There is a glory of Jehovah’s spirit, and there is a glory of Satan’s spirit. And the glory of Jehovah’s spirit is -- Jehovah in the soul realm is -- Christ. And the glory of Satan’s spirit -- Satan in the soul realm -- is the carnal mind.
So we find the swelling of the Jordan in prophecy speaking about the expression of Satan’s spirit in the soul realm. And Satan’s overriding characteristic is pride and arrogance. In Luke 4, verse 1 -- let me tell you what I found there. Lost my place; excuse me. OK. OK, here it is. In Luke 4, verse 1, there is no modifying word. I went up and down several verses before and several verses after. There’s no modifying word. And I nei- -- neither did I find the verse modifying the word. It just says Jordan.
So what does that mean? It means that I suspect very strongly that the hidden meaning or the hidden reason that the Holy Ghost used the word Jordan -- because it doesn’t even make any sense. It doesn’t even make any sense with regard to the temptation -- “And Jesus being full of the Holy Ghost returned from the Jordan.” What do you mean, He returned from the Jordan? Well, I guess it could mean He came up out of the water, but to return: It means to go back. It just doesn’t make any sense to me at all.
So we’re going to take the translation, which just means flowing down. Flowing down: That would mean going down to the soul realm. Well, that still doesn’t make any sense, so let’s take a look at this.
This verse I had to look up in my Concordant Interlinear. The -- I have two Greek Interlinears that I work with. The Concordant Greek Interlinear is much more difficult to work with. And the only time I go to that interlinear is when I’m not satisfied or something in my spirit is saying I’m just not getting the whole picture in my Green’s [SP] Interlinear. So I went into the Concordant Greek text, and I did see something different than I saw in Green’s Interlinear. And this is how God showed it to me. I want to -- I’m going to read it to you as it appears in the Concordant Greek text.
“Jesus, yet full of spirit, holy, returns from the Jordan.” Now we had this same principle recently in our message called “The Unforgivable Sin.” We found out that there was a word that was translated the Holy Spirit, and we found out that it really wasn’t the Holy Spirit, that the word holy sh- -- if you look at it in the Greek, should have been modifying another word. And we also ran into this when we did Romans 8:20, I believe -- 8:20 or 21. We found out that the King James translators took a modifying word and modified the wrong word with it. Does anybody not know what I’m talking about?
Let me continue. I’ll let you ask questions later if I haven’t been able to convey this to you. So the Interlinear says, “Jesus, yet full of spirit, holy, returns from the Jordan.” And I’ll just tell you up front I’m suggesting to you that the word holy is modifying the word return. I’ll show it to you; just try and hang in there with me.
“Jesus, yet full of spirit, returns holy from the Jordan.” He didn’t return wet from the Jordan. He didn’t return born-again from the Jordan. He returned holy from the Jordan. He was not holy when He went down under the water; He was a carnal man. But when He returned from the Jordan, when He rose up out of the Jordan, He was holy. He went down a natural man, and He came up a man in full stature. Let me read it for you again. “Jesus, yet full of spirit, returns holy from the Jordan.”
So I’m suggesting to you that the word holy is not modifying the word spirit, but it’s modifying the word returns. And let me tell you how I even got into asking the Lord this question. What didn’t sit right with me -- let me read it to you in the King James again. “And Jesus being full of the Holy Ghost returned from Jordan.” What didn’t sit right with me was that the revelation that I’m walking in now is that when you’re in full stature, you don’t have the Holy Ghost anymore. When you’re in full stature, you have the Spirit of Christ.
So I had a contradiction between what God has taught me to date and what I was seeing in the Scripture. Now either what I had been believing to date is wrong -- and if it’s wrong, I have to admit it and change it -- or there’s something wrong with my understanding of this Scripture. And that was why I went into the Greek Concordant text. And when I went into the Greek Concordant text, the way it’s written there, God showed me that the word holy is not modifying spirit, but it’s modifying the return. It’s modifying the descent. That’s what it’s modifying: the return. He returned in a holy condition. You don’t have to agree with me. Does anybody not understand what I’m saying? OK.
“Jesus yet full of spirit returned holy from the Jordan.” Or we could say: And Jesus’ perfected spirit -- remember the word full means perfected. And Jesus’ perfected spirit turned back. The word returns can be translated turn back. And Jesus’ perfected spirit turned back or turned away from the carnal mind. Jordan means to descend. Jesus’ perfected spirit turned away from that descended part of Him, which was His carnal mind. He turned away from it. And He turned toward holiness. And Jesus’ perfected spirit turned back from the carnal mind He inherited from His mother and turned towards holiness.
And there is -- we did find a Scripture somewhere in the Book of Revelation that had a similar sound to it. And what it was saying was that when Christ is formed in somebody and when He’s formed in them to a parti- -- whatever degree of maturity is necessary, that any demons dwelling in that man’s mind will be so offended and horrified by the Christ that’s rising like a sun, rising on the horizon, in the mind of that person that we -- you’re going to reach a point where they’re not going to have to be cast out of you anymore. They’re just going to flee from you. They’re going to find it so offensive being in the same temple with Christ that they’re going to flee. See, now the church world tells you: How can the Holy Ghost live in the same temple with the demons? The question is: How can the demons live in the same temple with the Holy Ghost? We got it backwards, brethren. We got it backwards.
Alternate Translation, the first half of Luke 4:1, “And Jesus, by His perfected spirit, turned away from the sin-filled carnal mind He inherited from His mother, and He turned towards holiness.” Do you hear this? And Jesus, because His spirit was perfected, found the strength to turn away from His carnal mind. What does that mean? He turned away from thinking with His carnal mind, and He turned towards holiness. He started using his Christ mind for every thought that came through, and He did it by the strength of His perfected spirit.
You can’t do it in your own spirit. You can’t do it in your human spirit. You cannot perfect yourself or protect yourself in your human spirit because if you do, it’s a defense that’s put up by Leviathan, which is pride. It might work for a season. It might work for a season. It’s like a temporary cast on your leg. It’s going to come a time where it’s not going to work anymore. It does work for a season definitely. No question about it. When the day comes that Christ wants to appear in you, it’s going to have to go, just like everything else, from your carnal mind.
And I never -- I can never forget a “Star Trek” episode that I saw. It was about a robot that was sent out by the world system. It had a good commission. It was supposed to go out sterilizing microbes or diseases that would destroy planets or destroy crops. It had a search and destroy mission. It was a good robot.
But somehow it passed through a meteorite shower, and it’s programming got changed just a hair, just a hair, and something changed in its memory banks. And it no longer was just searching out and destroying microbes or things that were destructive to man. It began to search out and destroy everything that wasn’t perfect.
And man, being imperfect, became a potential victim of this robot. And it was trying to wipe out all of humanity. That which started out as something beneficial to humanity had become destructive to the very thing it was built to protect.
And we have the same principle in our teaching. I think the name of the message is called “The Roots of Denial,” where we did a study on narcissism, and we found out this is exactly what has happened in the narcissistic mind: that a part of the personality has risen up to protect another part of the personality. But because of imperfection in the part that was protecting, it did not protect itself but wound up destroying itself by blocking it off behind a wall and isolating it.
That which was meant to do good has done evil. We hear the converse of that in the Scripture. It says: You meant it for my evil, but God turned it for my good. Well, we know that every good thing that God does is perverted by Satan. So that which your own soul meant to do for your good, Satan in your unconscious mind turned for your evil. Praise the Lord.
Alternate Translation, the first half of Luke 4:1, “And Jesus, by His perfected spirit, turned away from the sin-filled carnal mind He inherited from His mother, and He turned towards holiness.”
Continuing with the second half of Luke 4:1, “And Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness.” The Greek word translated by is Strong’s 1722, and by is really not an accurate translation. In -- I-N -- is a much more accurate translation. And the word spirit, as I told you earlier, is not modified. What does that mean? Does anyone know what that means that the word spirit is not modified? Does anybody know what that means? It means that we don’t know which spirit it is.
Every spirit is not of God, brethren; therefore, try the spirit. If the Greek does not say the Holy Spirit or the Spirit of Christ or the Spirit of truth, we don’t know. And if it doesn’t say the spirit of Satan -- although I don’t really know off-hand of any Scripture that has ever said the spirit of Satan. It just says Satan. But we know that Satan has taken up the spiritual authority or the role of a spirit. So we have an unmodified word, spirit, which means we don’t know what kind of a spirit it is. It means we have to test it. So Jesus was led by the spirit into the wilderness.
Now the average Christian reading Luke 4:1 after reading Matthew 4:1 would say, well, we looked up every word in Matthew 4:1, and we found out that it was Satan taking Jesus up into the spiritual realm of the soul, so it must mean the same thing. But it doesn’t mean the same thing.
Don’t ever take anything for granted in the Scripture. Every little word means something. The change of one word could change the whole meaning of the sentence. And as I mentioned earlier as we were starting: When you see an account, such as the temptation, written three times in three different gospels, it would be wisdom in your mind to think automatically there must be some subtle variation in each account of it. Otherwise why would the Scripture repeat it three times?
So we’re going to find out that in Luke 4:1, it’s not ta- -- Luke 4:1 is not talking about Satan catching Jesus’ carnal mind up, or it’s not talking about Satan manifesting in Jesus’ carnal mind. It’s talking about the Father manifesting through the Christ mind. Jesus, there were two of Him. He was a double-minded man. He had two minds, and each mind -- every mind has a god. Every mind has a god.
Now there is just one God of Christ -- His name is Jehovah -- but there are many gods of the carnal mind, many Satans, many manifestations of Satans in the carnal mind because he is divided. What does that mean? It means that Satan in one person’s mind is not necessarily in agreement with Satan in someone else’s mind is what it means.
What that means is that people who practice witchcraft fight against each other. If you know anything about witchcraft, you know that that’s true especially in cultures where it’s very common. Someone hires somebody to put a curse on some woman’s -- on some woman because they want his [sic] husband. She goes to another spiritualist, and they put a curse on the other woman, or they break it. Witches strive with one another. Practices -- practitioners of witchcraft strive with one another.
I personally know someone who this happened to. Someone put a curse on her family, and her husband rose up and left. Left her with the three kids. It was obvious. I’m not going to take the whole time on this message. It was obvious that a curse was placed on the family.
So her mother, being of a culture that is very familiar with this, took her to a witch. And I guess they don’t call themselves a witch. It was right here in the United States. I don’t rea- -- I really don’t know what they call themselves. And this person had spiritual power also and broke the power of the first witch. How do I know she broke the power of the first witch? The guy came back. Hallelujah.
OK, the word was led, “And Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness” -- was led. It’s Strong’s 71, and it’s a different word than the word translated led in Matthew 4:1. This word led means to lead by laying hold of, and it’s used of forces or influences affecting the mind. It also means to celebrate a feast.
And you may remember that the Greek word translated led in Matthew 4:1 was a word that meant to catch up. And it was describing Satan’s manifesting in the carnal mind in the man Jesus. The man Jesus had two minds.
But in Luke 4:1, the Greek word translated led means something was happening in His mind. And I’m going to choose the translation to celebrate a feast. Now why would I tran- -- choose that translation? Because in the Hebrew society to celebrate a feast or the celebration of a feast was always accompanied by a what? Does anybody know? Was it -- I didn’t hear you?
Going up.
Going up, that’s true. It was also always accompanied by a sacrifice. And I want to suggest to you that Jesus was led up by the spirit for the specific purpose of sacrificing the carnal mind. Both army camps had the same commission: Kill the other guy. The carnal mind was commanded to sacrifice Christ, and Christ was commanded to sacrifice the carnal mind. The battle’s called Armageddon.
Let me give you some more details. In Matthew 4:1 we’re told that the spirit of Satan -- in Matthew 4:1 now, we established that it was the spirit of Satan caught Jesus up into the soul realm so that the carnal mind could engage him in a spiritual battle, in which he hoped the newly born mind of Christ would be killed and sacrificed to Satan. And we found words that meant that in a previous message.
But in Luke 4:1, we’re told that Jesus was in the Spirit, in the Spirit. Remember I said the word by should really be translated in. “And was led by the Spirit” -- the Greek word is not by; the Greek word is in. He was in the Spirit. In Matthew 4:1 there’s nothing at all about Jesus being in the Spirit. He was caught up by the spirit of Satan, but in Luke 4:1, He’s in the Spirit. And I suggest to you that the phrase, in the Spirit, is talking about the Spirit of God.
So Jesus was in the Spirit when he was taken into the wilderness to sacrifice His carnal mind unto Jehovah. And there’s also a difference in the tense of the word to be led. In Matthew 4:1 it was in the future. Jesus was led up so that in the future -- I can’t remember the exact word -- the carnal mind could sacrifice the mind of Christ. But in Luke 4:1, the tense is present, and it’s -- what does that mean? It means that it’s already happening. It’s already happening; it’s not going to be some time in the future. Jesus was in the spirit, and He was being taken into the wilderness. And He was sacrificing His carnal mind unto Jehovah.
So what do we see here? We see that it was Satan’s intention, it was Satan’s motive to manifest the carnal mind for the purpose of sacrificing Christ, but it was a motive that had not yet been put into action. How do I know that? The verb was in the future. But when we talk about the mind of Christ manifesting in the man Jesus, the verb is present. So from the second Jesus was in the Spirit, He was already in the process of sacrificing His carnal mind.
So Satan had a plan, but Christ was carrying out His plan. Anybody not see the difference? Satan had a plan; he never implemented it. He never got close enough to Jesus to touch Him or to break any of His bones, however you want to put it. It was Satan’s intention to sacrifice Christ, but he never got a chance to begin to do it. Why? Because Christ was already in there, doing it. Hallelujah. Glory to God.
So we see in this contrast -- what contrast? The contrast between Luke 4:1 and Matthew 4:1 -- that Satan still had the authority to catch Jesus’ carnal mind up or to manifest in Jesus’ carnal mind but that at the very same time that he was doing that, Jesus was in the Spirit, or Jesus was in the Christ mind. And that Christ mind was being led by the Father into the very same spiritual place for the specific purpose of sacrificing His carnal mind to Jehovah.
Alternate Translation, the second half of Luke 4:1, “And Jesus was led by the Spirit of God into the spiritual realm of the soul to sacrifice His carnal mind up to the Father.” That meant there was nothing that His carnal mind could promise Him that would make Jesus agree to sin. That’s what that means. There was nothing -- no price -- that Jesus wouldn’t pay to deny His carnal mind. There was not anything that He would not give up. And we found out in a previous message that He had given up everything of this soulish life.
And fasting from food is very nice; some people say it’s good for your body. Maybe it is. And we hear a lot about fasting in the Scripture, but it’s important to know, all you Pharisees that are hearing this message, that fasting from food is just kindergarten. If you intend to really go on in Christ, you have to start fasting from soulish pleasures as Jesus takes it from you.
Don’t do it as a religious work because you’re just going torture yourself, and there’s not going to be any spiritual growth in it at all. But the true fast is, as you are led of the Spirit of God to work with Him as best you can, to fast from soulish pleasures. And it’s a simultaneous action of giving up soulish pleasures and spiritual increase.
And I want to tell you: All of the religions of the world know this, except the Christians. Buddhists know it; Hindu’s know it. All of the spiritual religions of the world know that you can’t really have both, that you can have both for a season, but -- I’m correcting myself. You can have both for a season, but the degree of spiritual power that you have is directly related to the measure of which you’re giving up these soulish pleasures.
So of course you could be somewhere between. If you have a scale from 1 to 10, you could be in the middle. You could have some soulish pleasures and some spiritual authority. But if you want to go on with the spiritual authority, you’re going to have to decrease the soulish pleasure in your life. Does anyone not know what I’m talking about?
And don’t go ahead of the Lord because you’re just spinning your wheels. You cannot force spiritual growth. Jesus is the only one who can give spiritual increase, and He’s not impressed with your religious works. And also let me say that as He increases you spiritually, whatever soulish pleasure it is that it’s time for you to give up will fall away naturally. He will arrange the circumstances, and it will fall away naturally. Glory to God.
Alternate Translation, second half of Luke 4:1, “And Jesus was led by the Spirit of God into the spiritual realm of the soul to sacrifice His own carnal mind up to the Father.” What does that mean? He was willing to totally deny every aspect of His carnal mind so that the Father, through His Christ, could be glorified in His mind and in His thoughts.
Don’t answer it. Hit -- would you hit pause please. Just hit pause.
Alternate Translation, the whole of Luke 4:1, “And Jesus turned away from His carnal mind towards holiness by the strength of His perfected spirit. And He was led by the Spirit of God into the hol- -- into the spiritual realm of the soul to sacrifice His carnal mind up to the Father.” I don’t know; that gets me very excited. “And Jesus turned away from His carnal mind” -- anyone that thinks it’s easy to turn away from your carnal mind is naïve.
You know, there’s a whole element in the church preaching that: Well, just ignore it, brother. It’s just your lower side. Make sure -- ma- -- just make believe it’s not there. Well, if you think that it’s working for you now, it’s only working by the sheer strength of your willpower.
When the day comes that Christ breaks your willpower, you’re going to find yourself without any foundation. If you think that you’re making it and that it’s Christ in you making it and it’s not Christ in you making it but it’s a foundation made up of your pride, when the day comes that Christ arises in you -- this is not a punishment. It’s not a punishment. Listen to me. When the day that Christ rises in you, that is the testing of your works. Is there not a Scripture that says: And every man’s works will be proven by fire? There is a Scripture that says that.
When Christ arises in you -- if the foundation, the spiritual foundation by which you are surviving and prospering in this world, is made out of something that came out of your carnal mind, which is typified by hay, wood or stubble, when Christ arises in you, it will burn up. Not a punishment: a natural result of what’s happening in your life. Here you are, sitting in church, praying that Christ appear in you, not realizing that your defenses and your mechanisms for surviving in this world are made out of your carnal mind, are made out of hay, wood and stubble, and that the very answer to your prayer that Christ appear in you is going to bring down everything you’ve been standing on for your entire life. Does anyone not know what I’m talking about?
But if your foundation is made of precious metal, if it’s made out of gold and silver, it shall abide the fire. Now, brethren, if your foundation is made out of hay, wood and stubble, that’s OK. As Christ arises in you, He’ll build His foundation in you. He’s build His foundation in you, but that hay, wood and stubble, it’s got to come down. It has got to come down. It’s got to come down. Why? Because once He’s engrafted to your soul and once He’s made you His, He’s not playing with you. He wants the whole thing.
So most of us enter into this a little naively. I remember when I answered an alter call for tabernacles, which is the last experience with God, I went running up to the front of the church, jumping up and down, screaming, Jesus! Take me! Take me! Take me! I want to tell you if I had any idea what I was saying, I really don’t know whether or not I would have said it. I entered into severe trails thereafter.
When Jesus takes you, He burns you with fire. Everything that is not of Him will not abide in His kingdom. And don’t think I’m s- -- I’m encouraging you not to seek God. I am certainly encouraging you to seek God, but I’m telling you that this is not child’s play.
You cannot keep your hay, wood and stubble and have your gold also. Can’t do it. Can’t play with God. How do they say it? They say: Can’t play church, right? Well, you can play church up unto a certain point. Then either you go back into the world, or you go on with God. And if you go on with God, that God that’s in the midst of you isn’t fooling with your hay, wood and stone. It’s going to burn. It’s going to be tied in bundles and burnt by men. Remember that Christ is a man. It’s going to be -- all of your carnal works are going to be tied in bundles and burnt by men, by the spiritual man, Christ Jesus.
I have a few comments on Mark 1:12. It’s only one sentence. “And immediately the spirit driveth him into the wilderness.” Did I make it clear why I drew the conclusion that the Spirit was the Spirit of God in Luke 4:1? “And Jesus turned away from His carnal mind towards holiness by the strength of His perfected spirit. So therefore He was led by the Spirit of God into the soul realm.” Does anybody have a problem with that? Sometimes you just do the best you can. It’s not that clear there, but it satisfies me.
Mark 1:12, “And immediately the spirit driveth him into the wilderness.” The Greek word translated immediately is Strong’s 2117, and it doesn’t mean immediately. It means straight, upright, true. Or it could also be translated salvation. And the true -- well, let me put it to you this way: And immediately the spirit -- or we can say, and straight the spirit or the true spirit driveth Him into the wilderness. I don’t know about you, but the true spirit seems pretty far from immediately to me. That’s one big difference.
“And the true spirit driveth him into the wilderness.” Driveth who into the wilderness? The word him is Strong’s 846, and it can be translated himself. And I want to suggest to you that the true Spirit has only one power source, and that is Himself. So for the true Spirit to be driven into the wilderness, He drove Himself.
The Greek word translated driveth is Strong’s 1544, and it means to lead one forth or away somewhere with a force, which one cannot resist. The force of the true Spirit is irresistible. It is irresistible. If you are being drawn by the true Spirit, you are coming wherever He’s drawing you to. There’s no place you can run; there’s no place you can hide, so don’t push against the pricks because you’re just spinning your wheels.
But if you’re not coming, it means you’re not being drawn by the true Spirit. He’s doing what He’s doing in this hour. And He’s doing it, and He’s not stopping. He’s not weak. He’s not incapable of saving some men, who in the death of their mind have resisted Him or blasphemed Him. He is God almighty. He’s a powerful or the most powerful energy source in the universe. And He’s doing what He’s doing, and if you get caught in His tractor beams, you’re coming. And there’s no place to run. Not that there’s anything wrong with coming; it’s just that human beings’ original reaction to being called of God is usually one of: No, not me.
Alternate Translation, Mark 1:12, “And the true Spirit forced Himself into the spiritual realm of the soul.” So as I mentioned earlier, Satan was getting ready for the battle through his carnal mind. Jehovah was preparing the man Jesus through the mind of Christ by leading Him slowly by the Spirit. But this power source of the Spirit drove Himself into the soul realm.
And let me point out to you that Matthew 4:1 is talking about the carnal mind, which is in the man Jesus. Luke 4:1 is speaking about the mind of Christ, which is in the man Jesus. But Mark 1:12 is not speaking about the man Jesus; it’s speaking about the Spirit. It’s speaking about the Spirit. And the Spirit, being the power source, forced His way into the soul realm, which was occupied by Satan. He penetrated violently the spiritual, military defenses of this world system. Glory to God. It was a miracle. What happened in the man Jesus of Nazareth was a miracle.
So once again Matthew and Luke speak about the preparation of the two sides of Jesus’ mind for the battle, which would determine which mind -- carnal or Christ -- would control the man Jesus. But Mark tells us, just gives us the information, that the true Spirit attacked the enemy territory. There’s nothing said about the carnal mind or the false spirit attacking. There isn’t even anything said about a battle. It just said Satan got ready through his carnal mind. And Jesus, through His Christ mind, just -- by the power of the Spirit, just did it. Now that’s when the Christ mind is in full stature of course. We know we’re battling down here now. God help us.
“Then Satan caught Jesus’ carnal mind up into the soul realm for a spiritual battle with the Devil, who Satan was hoping would kill the newly born mind of Christ and sacrifice Him to Satan.”
“But at the same time, Jesus, who had rejected His carnal mind and chosen holiness by the strength of His perfected Spirit, was led by the Spirit of God into the very same place to sacrifice his carnal mind up to the Father.”
“And the true Spirit forced Himself into the spiritual realm of the soul.”
Did you hear what I did? I read you verse -- I read you these three verses consecutively. First I read Matthew 4:1. Then I read Luke 4:1. And then I read Mark 1:12. And it sounds like it would be three verses that would be following each other in the Scripture, but it’s not. It’s three verses from three different gospels. I’m going to read it one more time.
Matthew 4:1, “Then Satan caught Jesus’ carnal mind up into the soul realm for a spiritual battle with the Devil, who Satan was hoping would kill the newly born mind of Christ and sacrifice Him to Satan.”
Luke 4:1, “But at the same time, Jesus, who had rejected His carnal mind and chosen holiness by the strength of His perfected Spirit, was led by the Spirit of God into the very same place to sacrifice His carnal mind up to the Father.”
Mark 1:12, “And the true Spirit” -- after they both got ready -- “And the true Spirit forced Himself into the spiritual realm of the soul.” Hallelujah.
In Matthew and Mark, the account of Jesus being caught up follows immediately after the account of Jesus’ water baptism. And you may remember that in the series “Jesus and the Jordan,” we found out that at His water baptism, Jesus was also baptized with the Holy Spirit and that His human spirit was caught up to perfection. It all happened while He went down under the water.
It’s taking us a lot longer. Most of us went down under the water a long time ago, and we’re still fighting this war and hoping. But with the man Jesus of Nazareth, He went down under the water. He made that covenant with God, and the Lord did the whole thing all at once.
So in -- but in Luke, however, there is a genealogy between the account of Jesus’ water baptism and His catching up. If you look -- and I’m not going to read the whole thing, but if you look in Luke chapter 4, you’ll see that it gives the account of His water baptism. And then there’s almost a whole column, a whole half a page of genealogy.
And I’d just like to make a couple of comments on that genealogy as to why there would be a genealogy between the account of Jesus’ water baptism and the account of His temptation. Why is there -- why is the Scripture sticking a genealogy in between? It must mean something.
Luke chapter 3, verse 23, which comes right after the account of His water baptism, tells us that Jesus began to be 30 years of age at the time of His baptism. Now what that means is that if you have a birthday and you’re 20 years old, on the next day, you begin to be 21. And you spend a whole year getting to the point where you’re 21. So at the time of His baptism, Jesus began to be 30 years old. So we’re given information that He was 30 years old or close to 30 years old when this happened. That must be significant.
The only thing that I know about that that would mean is that you had to be 30 years old to enter into the function of a priest. And we know that Jesus i- -- was and is a high priest after the order of Melchizedek, so if there’s any other significance to that, I don’t know.
And verse 36 tells us that Jesus is a descendant of Noah’s son Shem. Jesus is a descendant of Noah’s son Shem. And verse 38 tells us that Jesus is the son of Adam, which was the son of God. Now why would all this be stuck in the middle of the account of the baptism and the temptation?
Well, I want to suggest to you that this is the Scripture’s hidden way of saying what we’re told about in 1 Corinthians 15:45, where it says that at the first or at the beginning, the man that was formed, Adam, was made as a living soul. But at the last -- at what last? At the end of the evolution of humanity -- don’t shut off the message, all you Pharisees.
There is an evolution of humanity. We are not evolving from fishes and monkeys into men, but man is evolving. Man is evolving. Even in our lifetime or in the last 100 years, we see the evolution of man from a creature who was basically a farmer, using his physical body to survive in this world, and to a society where man is more often using his mind. Some men are using both, but we see a society moving forward where people are desiring to use their minds. And they’re laboring less and less. So man is evolving within his manhood.
At the beginning, the man that God formed was a soul. He was soulish. That means he lived in his emotions. But at the end, man -- at the end of what? At the end of his experience in this world. Jesus said, “I am the alpha and the omega.” That means He was the beginning; He was Adam at the beginning. And He’s the omega; He’s Adam at the end. And man at the end shall be a quickening spirit. That means a spirit which has the ability to give life where there is no life.
And that’s what’s happening in this hour. If you have the seed of Christ in you and you have begun to move in the two-witness company, you are locking heads with the carnal minds of the people that it is Jesus’ intention to give His life to. And our natural example is that you cannot put a seed in the ground until you wound that ground. You got to pick up a plow or a pickaxe and turn that earth over to get the seed in it, or you’ll never get the seed to grow. And in this hour, the mind of Christ, in a company of imperfect believers, is going forth and turning over the ground of s- -- of believers’ minds -- believers, which are chosen and hand-picked by the Lord. And they’re wounding their carnal minds, and the seed of Christ is going in.
Jesus of Nazareth is the descendant of the man Adam, which was formed out of the dust of the earth and who died at the beginning of time. And if you can see it, what God has done is that He has picked one man out of all humanity and raised Him up as a savior to all humanity.
Everything that God does, He does in greater and lesser levels. He does the same thing with families. He s- -- if you find a troubled family, He’ll pick one person out of that family, and He’ll start working with them to heal them and to fix them up. And as soon as there’s -- they’re in any way capable of ministering to their family, He sends them right in.
You know, you may have noticed that God uses some very imperfect people, some very, very imperfect people. But as soon as Christ is mature enough in any human being to do any good whatsoever to another human being, Jesus is sending them. He’s not wasting a second; there’s too much work to do [?herding?] people everywhere. So He uses very imperfect vessels.
And I suggest to you that when Paul said to the church that he blessed them because they received him while he was in his infirmity -- they received him as an angel -- what he was saying was: They received him before he was perfect. And what they received was the Christ in him. They received the Christ in him while he was still a natural, imperfect man.
And that’s what God is doing in this hour. And he’s probably raising you up, if you’re hearing this message, to fix you up to send you back to your whole family. Don’t think He’s going to fix you up and send you out to foreign mission fields without you ministering to your own family because He’s not going to do it.
Jesus has an order. He has an order. You have a responsibility to your natural family. Some of us have some very troubled natural families. He’s not sending you back until you’re strong enough to help them. But He’s not likely to be sending you out in the mission field until you’ve done your good deed towards your flesh family. Not likely -- He could do anything He wants, but it’s not likely.
So we see Jesus doing on a lesser level what He’s doing in the man Jesus of Nazareth. He’s sending us back to our roots, that which spawned us. When He heals you, when He fixes you up, you owe Him. You’re not your own person. You’re bought with a price.
And when He takes you and He blesses you and He heals you and He solves problems in your life, brethren, you have just been inducted into the army. You belong to Him. You’re not your own man. And if you think you are, you’ll find out different.
I tell you a very hard word: He’s fixing you up to come into His service. I tell you the truth. And He loves us; yes, He loves us. But He’s not healing everybody today, and the ones that He heals, He’s calling into the army. He’s not healing you so that you can turn around and walk off and do your own thing. He has a dying world here that He loves and that He intends to raise from the dead. And He’s not healing you to go do your own thing.
I’d just like to remind you all that the teaching on the bones of Christ that every time a group gathers -- it doesn’t even have to be a large group; it could be just one person -- a spiritual formation takes place in your mind depending on what spirit is being revealed through you mind. And the way the Scripture describes it, when it’s Christ, is that it is the bones of Christ.
Now these are spiritual bones. Our natural type is a skeleton, but these are spiritual bones, and there’s a literal, spiritual structure erected over this meeting: invisible but discerned with the spiritual senses. Some people might think it’s a feeling of peace or a feeling of warmth, but as your spiritual senses develop as you mature in Christ, you come to realize that it’s not a feeling but it is a reality.
There is a spiritual presence over this meeting, and His name is Christ. So I’m not trying to give anybody a hard time, but if I ask you not to talk or to keep it spiritual, my whole motive -- and we’re into motives in this ministry -- is that I want to maintain the anointing so that it can bless us.
09/01/14 Transcribed by VerbalFusion
09/17/14 1stEdit CAS/BP
