Part 1 of 7 Parts

 

The Following Message Has Been Transcribed For
Clarity, Continuity Of Thought, And Punctuation By
 The LEM Transcribing & Editing Team.

 

Do not let it surprise you, brethren, if, in the hour of His appearing, Rosie stands up and she is the only one in the whole group, including me that can see the Lord. It would not surprise me in the least. That sounds just like something our God would do. Just in case there was any doubt in our mind that we were nothing, He would convince us for sure that we are less than nothing and if He is not in us, we are not even that because He is all that there is and everything of our own mind He calls exactly that -- nothing. It is in the scripture. That is what He calls us. That is what He calls man. That is what He calls the physical strength of man. That is what He calls the emotional strength of man. That is what He calls the spiritual strength of man. He says you are nothing unto Me and He laughs at us and everything that we produce from within ourselves, He likens it unto a weed and He is stepping on us. So if you feel like you have had someone’s foot in your face this last couple of days, it just maybe the Lord Jesus Christ. We were watching TV the other night and we saw Nancy Sinatra singing that famous song, these boots are going to walk all over me. He is walking all over us, brethren, because He is not winking anymore.

Romans, Chapter 8:  I am going to expound on Romans -- the name of the message is Romans Chapter 8, Part 1. However, I am going to expound on Romans chapter 7 from verses 15 through verse 25. The reason for that being that chapter numbers and verse numbers were not dictated through the Apostles who wrote these scriptures. Chapter numbers and verse numbers were put into the scripture by the King James translators and, as we have already discovered many times it is not unusual for these very fine scholars to have missed a spiritual point, thus making the breaking and starting a new chapter in the wrong place. And sometimes you have to go back to get the full context of what he is saying where you would like to start. So we have already done chapters 5, 6 and 7 in the Book of Romans. I do not know about you but I find it a very exciting book and the reason it is exciting to me is that it describes in detail what is happening in my walk with the Lord right now and what I see happening with many people right now.

In other words, what am I saying to you? It is the message of the hour for this fellowship and for whoever else God is ministering to in the same way that He is ministering to us. It is very exciting to me to see the scriptures come alive because, as I have told you many times, we have got to get out of fantasy land. We have got to come down out of our ivory towers. These scriptures must mean something to our everyday life. They must mean something to our emotions. They must mean something to the way we think. They must mean something to the way we solve problems. They have to mean something to us as individuals, to our families and to every aspect of our life or they are wasted on you. I do not care if you can stand up and quote me this whole Bible -- you know, there are men who could do that. They stand up and they quote long passages from memory. It does not mean a thing to them. It is just a work of the flesh. It puffeth them up. It makes them feel important when they are not important. Nobody is important. Everyone is dispensable by yourself. You are important for so long as you are in submission and obedient to your Master. When He has the use of your members, when you go where He tells you to go, when you stand up when He tells you to stand up, when you sit down when He tells you to sit down, when you speak the words that He wants you to speak, when you go out and speak to the one He wants you to speak to and you shut up for the one He does not want you to speak to, you have just become important because He is manifesting through you.

Let me tell you something, if you do not do it the guy down the block will do it and if the guy down the block does not do it, the guy down the other block will do it and He does not need you. Jesus said to the Jews, if you do not praise Me I will raise up these rocks to praise Me. He does not need us. Jesus.

Romans 7:15:  For that which I do -- Paul is speaking -- For that which I do I allow or I do not want to do. For that that I want to do, I do not do. But that which I hate I do. What kind of confusion is this? This is the Apostle Paul writing the Book of Romans, saying I do not have the spiritual strength to do what I want to do. With your life, with his mother’s life, with his employer’s life, he does not have the spiritual strength to do what he wants to do with his life, with his mind, with his body, with his ability to be holy or not be holy. And not only that, as if that is not bad enough, he is not only neutral he is doing everything he has promised himself time and time and time again not to do. Something is backwards. His body will not obey his mind. His soul, which is his emotions, will not obey his mind.

I want to tell you that I am experiencing this. There was a time in my life that I was very weak, believe it or not. Not only did my body do wrong things, not only did my emotions do wrong things, but my mind said yeah, yeah, yeah. All three of me was in agreement to mental activities and emotional and physical activities that were killing me. And then the Lord Jesus Christ had mercy on me and the first thing He changes in you when He has mercy on you is what? Where does the change begin?

            [INAUDIBLE]

It changes with your mind. So what does that mean? Any behavior that you change by the strength of your own carnal mind is a religious work in futility. What does that mean? It is worthless as far as God is concerned. It is dung. You are going to stop doing this and you are going to stop saying that and your heart is still desperately wicked, the word of the Lord to Israel who did such things is -- does anybody know? You are as? Menstruous rags. And you know what that means? You have probably heard it preached for years. Do you know what it means? The church and Israel -- Israel was the bride of Christ -- she was supposed to bear the child of the Father God. When a spirit lays with a man, what is the offspring? A mind. Israel was supposed to bear the mind, which is the Son of God. His name is? Christ. And she did not do it. So when you read in the King James of the Lord indicting Israel, saying you are as menstruous rags, what He is saying to her is you have not borne my child and every sign of piety and religiosity and cleanness, which is clean in your own eyes, as far as I am concerned, it is filthy rags. It is lies. It is dung. It is worthless. It is not of spirit. It cannot get you into the Kingdom. It will not save your life and you have not fooled Me.

And right after the Lord indicted Israel thusly, what happened to her? She died. He removed His spirit from her and she died. Foolish men -- foolish men to think you can play with God. I am going to change. There is a scripture in the Book of Job. When Job says that to the Lord, what are you doing this to me for? What are you giving me a hard time for? What are you letting me get sick? What did I lose? Everything. What did Job lose? He lost his wife. He lost his children. He lost his wealth. He lost his cows. He lost his sheep. He lost his house. He had nothing left and he was sick on top of it. And he had the nerve to say to God what did you do this to me for? If you would have just told me what my sin was I would have stopped doing it. And God’s answer to Job? Anybody know? You fool. You do not have the power to stop doing it.

You are lifted up in pride and your mind is filled with every evil work because that is pride that says unto God just tell me what is wrong. I will change. You will not change. You cannot change. You need Him to change you and He will break the arm of the pride of man and He will break the arm of man’s witchcraft spiritual power and He will crush you and you will serve Him because He is God and you are the worm. That is what He calls us. It is in the Bible. Does he not call us a worm?

So the great Apostle Paul cannot do what he sets his mind to do. Oh, I know what I was telling you. I am in this condition now. There was a time when my mind, spirit, soul, my emotions and my body were all in agreement, doing almost everything wrong in my life if not everything. The first thing that God changed was my mind. I now have a mind that most of the time -- most of the time, desires and wills to do right. I now have a soul, which is my emotions, whenever it can get out from under my mind, wants to do wrong in the way I feel. I have a body that pretty much does what it is told to do. But I want to tell you, I feel the split and there is a war going on between the mind of the spirit which is in me, which is saying to my flesh, you shall not sin. But I want to tell you that much too often to make me happy my flesh thumbs its nose at me and I feel things that I do not want to feel and I know that it is sin because my mind is not yet strong enough to whip my soul into righteousness. But that day is coming that the one that had the weak mind who now has a strong mind that is not quite strong enough to clean up my emotions is getting stronger every day and the day is coming that this mind which is in my -- His name is Christ -- He is going to whip my soul into shape and He is going to have the strength to stop me from sinning in my emotions.

And the day that happens this body will stop dying because this body dies because my emotions sin. My emotions are female, my mind is male and this husband in my head is not at this time strong enough to subdue His wife, my emotions. But He is getting stronger every day. And I expect this soul to come into submission and line up with the righteousness of God and when that happens this body will be completely healed of any and anything that is left in it. I am not going to huff and puff when I walk up the steps. I am going to be a perfect physical specimen and I want to tell you people something. There are people in this world who have excellent health because they were born that way. Nothing that they did to deserve it - just one of the blessings on the family line, just physically healthy and strong. And in that day that the mind of God comes to you and says to you follow me and you say no, He is going to start touching you. He did it to Job and He will do it to you. But my health that is rising now like a star -- my health is going to exist forever because it did not come as a gift that I did not deserve but it is coming as an inheritance reserved for me in Heaven because I have confessed my sin and I have repented of it and I have been healed by the Living God and that which God gives you no man can take away from you.

But any and every gift that you had in this world that was a gift to a fallen man, you can lose it. It is losable. But what God gives you after you confess your sins and repent, after you hit bottom and start up again, what God gives to you no man can take away from you. You are out there in the world. Some man can shoot you and you can die. I want to tell you, if you are serving God, I do not care who shoots you, you are not going to die. If God has a work for you and you are in obedience, doing that work as best you can, no man can kill you. No demon can kill you. No spirit can kill you. And if you are that far gone neither will your God kill you. He is just going to beat you until you do what He tells you to do. And you are speaking to a well-beaten son.

So I am experiencing today what Paul is writing about in Romans 7:15. My mind is not in agreement with my soul. Now one of two things happens when your mind is not in agreement with your soul. Brethren, either the emotions, which have spiritual power in them are going to break down the righteousness of your mind and bring your mind into submission to the ungodliness in your emotions or your mind is going to break your soul and force it to become holy. There is a war going on. How can two walk together when they are not in agreement? It cannot continue. The mind and the soul must agree. One of them is going to win the war. Either your fallen emotions or the righteousness which is in the mind is going to prevail over you. Right now you could evaluate yourself. Nobody is 100 percent. But you know. If you do not know, you ask God or you ask someone that is spiritually wise. They will know and they will tell you most of the time who prevails in your life. The mind of Christ, a righteous mind -- does a righteous mind prevail in you or do emotions which are destructive to you rule you? Fifty-one percent of the time who is the boss of your person? Reason, intelligence, wisdom or raging passions that will not rest until they kill you?

This is the condition that Paul was in and he openly confessed that he had a mind which told him to do righteous things but he had a soul that would not obey. He had a wife that just would not do what he told her to do and she was out committing adultery with Satan every day. He could not whip her into shape.

Verse 16:  If then I do that which I do not want to do, I consent unto the law that it is good. So Paul is saying now do not be depressed here. Do not be depressed because you have not made it 100 percent of the way. There is something good happening if 51 percent of the time or more, OK? Your mind is desiring the right thing. Do not be depressed if you do not have the strength to make your soul -- and some people do not have the strength to make their body obey -- something good is happening. Step number one, God looks at you and He sees that with your mind you are in agreement with the law of God. That is the first step to deliverance. And those who are not in agreement with the law of God, what are you called? What is your condition?

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Well, this -- what?

            [INAUDIBLE]

OK. These are all correct, but the word in my heart is rebellious. You are a rebel. You are in rebellion against the law of God. The reason I am choosing the word rebellion is the context of our teaching here is the law. So you are either in agreement with the law or you are in rebellion against the law. And if your mind is in rebellion against the law then you are reprobate. You see if you are not in agreement with the law with your mind that means you are not even trying to whip your soul and your body into shape. Then you are reprobate. If God has to come to you and convince you that there is something wrong with the way you think. How dare anybody tell somebody that there is something wrong with the way you think? I dare to tell you there is something wrong with the way you think because what you think does not line up with the law of God. We have an absolutely standard in this world. There are forces in this country today trying to discredit it and trying to tear it down, but there is an absolute -- what does absolute mean? Unchangeable, under no circumstances does this standard change. It does not change because time has gone by. It does not change because there is a war. It does not change because your feelings are hurt. It does not change because you lost your husband. It does not change because you lost your wife or because you lost your money. There is an absolute standard of righteousness in this world. It was given to us when?

            [INAUDIBLE]

Yes. It was given to us by Moses when the law was imparted to Israel in the form of the 10 Commandments. That is correct. So Paul says if your mind is in agreement with the law of God with the absolute standard of the creator of the universe, do not despair if your emotions are not lining up. And I have been teaching you that here for a long time. A very powerful weapon is confession. If you really do not have the strength to bring the sin which is in your emotions or in the mind that is in the flesh, the carnal mind, if the Christ in you genuinely does not have the strength to stop your emotions from sinning, do not yield to condemnation. Do not let any other human being condemn you. Neither let the accuser of the brethren which is in your own heart condemn you. But use and take advantage of God’s gift to you and ability to confess your sins. And if you can repent that is even better. But do not let anyone condemn you because you have not yet been able to change. But confess that sin. Confess as often as you can that you recognize that your emotions and your behavior do not line up with the law of God but that you at this present moment are powerless to change. If you do this, to those who do this, verse 1 of chapter 8, there is now no more condemnation in Christ Jesus. But your mind has to line up with the law of God for you to be freed from that condemnation. What is that condemnation? What is its affect on your life? Destruction unto death. So do not worry so much about your behavior and do not worry so much about the words that you are saying but start confessing that sin that the mercy of God might begin to penetrate your life and your heart and bring a change in the only place where change can take -- where lasting change can take place -- in the heart. Jesus.

Verse 17:  Now then once I do this -- once I do what? Once I confess my sins, that they are wrong, and ask God to forgive me, as far as God is concerned it is no longer I that is sinning in the mind of the flesh, in my emotions, and sometimes in my body. It is no longer I that do it but it is sin which dwelleth in me. Brethren, this is the true sanctification. This is the true sanctification. Do not tell me that you do not go to movies anymore and you are sanctified. Do not tell me that you do not fellowship with people in the world anymore and you are sanctified. Do not even tell me that you are not fornicating anymore and you are sanctified because it is not true. All those things are good, but sanctification takes place where? In the mind - when your mind falls out of agreement with the flesh that is the beginning of sanctification. There is nothing you could do to your body or with your mouth that will make you clean in God’s eyes because if that is all you have got, all you are is a Pharisee walking around with one big fat religious spirit hanging on your back and it is not doing anything but lifting you up in pride and your own self-righteousness that is going to drag you down and kill you.

Verse 18:  For I know that in me, that is in my flesh -- that is not only your body, that is your soul -- dwelleth no good thing for to will to do that which is right is present in my mind but how to perform that which is good, I cannot find out how to do it. Do you know somebody called me up on the phone the other day that I had not spoken to in a while, very frustrated because they lost their cool under a stressful circumstance and they said to me:  Sheila, answer a question for me. Is it possible -- is it possible to get such control over my emotions that I do not sin anymore? Tell me, is it possible? I have utterly failed to do it to date. My answer was yes, it is possible but not in your own strength. You shall never cease from sin in your own strength. So if you have a desire to cease from sin you must follow God’s plan as to how to do it because if you are so lifted up in pride that you think you could do it yourself you will fail every time. And not only that, but while you are so busy putting on your Pharisaical robe, looking good, all of the people that have done it God’s way are going to enter in to sinlessness and you are going to be locked out with your white-washed wall all by yourself. Yes, it is possible. But you must get the mechanism within you which makes it possible. Yes, ladies, it is possible for you to have a baby, but you must have a uterus. Someone women do not have uteruses. Yes, it is possible for you to walk but your legs must work. Some people do not have legs. Yes, it is possible to be without sin but you must have Christ as your mind to do it. And when He enters into you and He begins to be formed in you -- who? The mind of Christ, He will grow in grace and in wisdom until that day where the mind of Christ in you is strong enough to attack the carnal mind that you were born with and cut his head off as David cut off the head of Goliath and then set Himself on your soul as your head and you shall be sinless.

You cannot do it your way. It has to be God’s way. As far as I know the only one that this event has happened to is the Lord Jesus Christ. He told us in the days of His flesh that if a corn of wheat fell into the ground it would produce a great harvest. Jesus of Nazareth, who was the Christ, was that corn of wheat which fell into the ground. He gave up that existence so that He could become a glorified spirit so that He could pour out in the minds of all of us and bring forth the mind of Christ which will enable us to be sinless. And it has taken 2,000 years so far, but that event is about to happen. It is not going to happen to everybody at once. It is like a tomato plant. One morning you walk out and there is a ripe tomato on the plant. And the next day you come out and there are two more ripe tomatoes on the plant. But to date, to the best of my knowledge, there is no human being in the earth today that has attained to this promise but it is about to happen very, very soon. A door is opening in Heaven and only those who are ready are going through. We must occupy until He comes. We must do everything possible to do to be prepared as we could be and then His promise to us is He is coming down from Heaven and laying hold of those who are reaching and stretching towards Him and He is grabbing hold of us and yanking us through.

So there is something for us to do. There is work for us to do. Everyone that has the hope of this promise -- what? What does he do? Purifies himself, not his words and he does not wash his hands. His mind. When you are yielding full scale to pride and rebellion there are no words that you could say that are going to make you clean or words that you could not say that are going to make you clean. Because pride is a stench in God’s nose. He hates it.

Verse 19:  For the good that I would do -- I am sorry. Back in verse 18 he is saying he finds it that he cannot perform the good that he would do. OK. Verse 19:  But the good that I do not want to do -- I am sorry. I am having trouble reading it. Let me start with verse 18:  For I know that in me dwelleth no good thing for the will is present with me to desire to do good things is present with me but how to perform that which I -- what -- why am I stumbling over this verse? But how to perform that which is good I cannot figure out how to do it man. Because the good that I would like to do I do not do but the evil that I would prefer -- that I would not do if I had the power, that is what I do.

Verse 20:  Now if I do what I do not want to do it is no more I that do it but sin that dwelleth in me. OK. I guess I backed up a little. That is the sanctification. It is the falling out of agreement between your mind and your soul. Two cannot walk together unless they be in agreement. Sanctification is the falling out of agreement with the sin that you have been yielding all of your life. You have to get a conviction by the grace of God that it I filthy, that it is corrupt, that it is perverse, that it is a stench in your own nose, that you are chocking on your own filth and that you want another chance in life.

Verse 21:  I find then a law that when I would do good evil is present with me. Now check this out, brethren, he does not say evil is present in my wife. He does not say evil is present in my husband. He does not say evil is present in my boss or my mother or my father or my sister or my brother or the guy that is threatening to hurt me or sue me. But evil is present with me. Where? In my own mind.

Let me -- does anybody remember the difference between the law and a commandment? Can anybody give us that? The difference between a law and a commandment? OK. A commandment is -- another word for commandment is an ordinance. I could say to you for 24 hours straight, please shut this fan off. If you do not get up off that couch and walk over here and shut it off I do not have any power to force you to do this. I do not have a physical law within my own members that would enable me to drag you off of that couch and force you to shut that fan off. I do not have that kind of physical strength. Although there are people who do. So a commandment tells you what to do, tells you what is right, but has no force -- has no power to enforce it. The law has power to enforce. If you do not get up off of that couch and shut off this fan I have the power to put you in jail. The law has authority to enforce. The law has power. The commandment has no power. Laws have power. Commandments have no power. Commandments state rules that if you follow them will bring good results into your life, but you must find from somewhere the strength to follow the rule. Laws have power to perform.

I then saw into law that when my heart’s desire is to do good evil is present with me. I find then a law. I find then a power that when my heart’s desire is to do good there is a spiritual power in me that against my will drags me off of that couch and makes me shut off the fan. Not even with a threat. When my mind says I desire to be righteous I find that within me, in my own mind exists a spiritual authority which drives me and forces me, overriding my own mind which says this is wrong, to do that which is evil. It is a law in your members that has authority over you and will continue to have authority over you and will do whatever he wants with you until and unless a stronger law comes in to join with your mind, who desires to do what is right. This is no game you are playing. You are fooling around with Satan himself. When are you going to wise up?

Verse 22:  For I delight in the law of God after the inward man. There are two men. We are two men. I think I mentioned it the other night. You do not have to be Christ to be two men. You do not have to have the mind of Christ to be two men. Everyone of us, every human being born, is born in what? Sin. Shaped in what? Inequity. Every human being born is evil. Yes, even that one-day old baby who has not had any opportunity to sin has been born with an inherited sin nature and if left to his own devices, if he is not loved and taught to do righteousness, will do evil continuously and without restraint because man’s nature is evil. Therefore you must take that baby and teach it discipline and teach it righteousness. And this process develops a second man in that baby. That human being -- when I say man I am talking about men and women. I am talking about human beings. They have the nature that they were born with, which is desperately wicked. The heart of man is desperately wicked. Who would know it? And then a second man develops. That man that is put in there, that is forced in there by loving parents and other loving relatives or friends that are present in that child’s life. They put in a mindset that is directly opposed to that person’s nature.

So we see that there is an inward man, whether someone actually has Christ being formed in them or not. That inward man that is imparted by loving relatives however, depending on the family line history and family line curses, may or may not be strong enough to overcome that child’s evil nature. Some children come down on a family line with a lot of sin on it. There is all different kinds of sin. The sin that is most likely to destroy your children -- anybody? Pride.

            [INAUDIBLE]

Rebellion.

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Idolatry. Idolatry. Idolatry, pride and rebellion, homosexuality and all forms of sexual sin and perversion will cause your children to be born -- or let me put it this way -- may cause your children to be born with a sin nature which will prove to be stronger than all of the religious training and all of the love -- or let me put it this way -- which may prove to be stronger than the mind or the other man which will be formed by the best and the greatest love and religious and moralistic training available to mankind. When your family tree gets to that point, brethren, you are headed on the way out and there is only one force in the universe that can turn that path around and His name is Christ Jesus. When your family line hits that place you no longer have a choice. And what do I mean you are on your way out? Well people start dying. People start dying young. Insanity crops up. Some of the children do not get married and do not bear children or they bear children and they die or they do get married but they are barren. I want to tell you when God shuts down a family line He cuts off your reproductive processes. He does not throw down a lightning bolt at you. He starts drying up your reproductive forces.

Verse 23:  I think I left out a very important sin that affects -- a very powerful sin on the family line. Illegitimate birth. I did say sexual corruption. Illegitimate birth puts a curse on that child that is very powerful. If your child has been born or conceived out of wedlock you have the option of confessing your sin and repenting, dedicate that child to God and ask the Lord to break those curses on him or her because that is no small curse. That is a major curse and if it does not show up on that child it will surely show up on that child’s child. But it usually shows up right in the first generation. Why is that? Because the sin that is operating in the person who bore the illegitimate child had to be pretty severe for them to bear an illegitimate child. We have the sin of rebellion and the sin of fornication. It might be a rebellion against God’s law, against the way they were raised if they were raised that way. So for a person to have an illegitimate birth outside of, God forbid, them being raped or something like that, the sin on that person, on that woman, is pretty developed. So the child who was born of fornication inherits all of his mother’s sin which led up to that one act of fornication which resulted in illegitimate birth. All of this is able to be broken in Christ. But you need to confess your sins and repent because the wrath of God is upon all those who are disobedient. If you think you have had bad luck you do not know what you are talking about. You have not had bad luck. Destruction is after you, hindering every good thing that tries to come into your life. I can tell you that because it was all over me and I know it when I see it on someone else.

The inward man which is spoken about in verse 22, I believe that Paul is speaking about the Christ man that is being formed in him. I have added in this extra piece of information. I do not know where these messages are going and you need the information yourself. Everybody that listens to these messages are in training. We do not have any babies here. This is a mature ministry. Anybody that is here, God has them here for a purpose. You need to know that people who do not have Christ, people who are not even what you would call Christians, can have an inward man. You need to know that. That God is no respecter of persons and He loves people and He is not denying anybody anything because they do not go to your church. You cannot be a son of God if that is your mentality. Your primary objective when God sends you to somebody should not be to get them to come to your church. I do not care if there is one person sitting here.

When God sends somebody to me my objective is to give them what God tells me to give them. My objective is that they should get what God has for them. That my God should look at me and say good and faithful servant. He is not a God of Living Epistles Ministry. He is not a God of Pentecost. He is not even only the God of Christianity. He is the God that has made this whole creation and He is everybody’s God, no matter where they are or how messed up they are in this hour. He is not the God of the dead. He is the God of the living. And who are the living? Who is the living?

            [INAUDIBLE]

Well, more than that. In the context -- that is true, but in the context that I just said it, the living is Eve. She is the mother of all living. He is the God of all spirits and He is the God of the spirit in every man, no matter what they are engaged in. No matter what activity they are engaged in. If they are engaged in the worst activity you know of, God has the power, if He decides to do so, to kill that person and take His spirit back. That is what He did in the flood. Humanity was so corrupt that He killed their flesh. The body went back to the earth; the soul went back to the [INAUDIBLE]. He knocked down everything. He dismantled everything. He broke it up and He took back His spirit. He is the God of all spirits. There is really just one spirit. Every human spirit has a God. His name is the Lord Jesus Christ who was one with Jehovah at this time. And in this hour, now that the provision to rescue the fallen creation is in the earth, most of the time He is reforming the person. But sometimes He kills their flesh. But whether He reforms you or whether He kills your flesh, your spirit is His and your personality is just dust.

You are His possession. This is the hour, the time for the redemption of the what? That purchased possession. That is you. He wants what is His. He is not playing with you. Man is utterly ignorant. The Bible says his mind is in darkness, his eyes are blind, his ears cannot hear, his heart is covered over, he cannot feel. He does not know anything about spiritual things. You think, oh you foolish human beings, because He has been leaving you alone for all of these thousands of years, that either He does not exist or He is not going to bother you. You are a fool. What good does it do a man that gains the whole world and that night the Lord says I want your soul. Your spirit is His. You know what that means? That means you are going to die. I am taking my spirit back and your soul is going to die. Your personality is going to die. You are being taken off the earth. Leave it to all your relatives. You cannot take it with you man.

Verse 23:  But I see another law in my members. Now the first law is in verse 21. I saw a law that when I would do good evil was present with me. So the first law is the law of evil. In verse 23 we read but I see another law in my members warring against the law of my mind. I guess that is the same law. That is the same law of evil. But I see another law in my members warring against the law of my mind. His members is his soul and his body. And bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. There is a law of sin. A law being power, spiritual power. Paul said there is spiritual power in his member. In his soul, which is his emotions, and in his body, there is a law. There is spiritual power that brought him into captivity despite the fact that the mind of Christ in him said I will not do it. You may recall my preaching to you that if you want deliverance -- I have this on a lot of messages -- you not only have to confess your sin and repent but you must resist. If you want deliverance from drug addiction or any form of compulsion -- well, the example I have used -- I have it on at least five messages -- the example that I have used is all the way to the liquor store you have to be screaming every step of the way Jesus help me. I can stop. As you chug-a-lug that bottle down to the last drop, the last word out of your mouth should be, "Jesus, help me. I did it against my will." That is the man who gets delivered. So your mind has to be out of agreement with your emotions and the cravings of your body.

Verse 24, "O wretched man that I am!" What does that mean? It means that for that temporary condition and that time period that your mind and your emotions and your body are not in agreement with one another, that there is a division in your own person, that your mind is pulling this way, and your emotions and your body is pulling that way. It is not pleasant. You are unhappy. You are stressed out. Maybe you are in pain, physical pain, emotional pain, mental pain.

Brethren, we need to know this because if you have heard some of that false doctrine that says you are supposed to be happy all the time, you need to know that there is pain in the spiritual experience which ends with your conversion from a flesh man into a spiritual man. You need to know that it is not unnatural that you are feeling the pain, and do not let anybody tell you that you should not be feeling it or that there is something wrong with you for feeling it or that is -- that you have no right to express it.

Now you can express your pain, but there is a line that you can go over where it becomes an ungodly spirit of complaining or self-pity, but you have a right to express your pain, and you have a right to receive compassion from a minister of Christ. But if you go over that line, if that minister is on their toes, they will tell you that is enough. You need to know there is pain in this thing. Do not let someone say to you -- or condemn you for not having a smile on your face at the moment of your pain. Brethren, you have to get passed it, and you have to go on. And it is a good thing to put a smile on your face and good forward.

"O wretched man that I am! Who shall deliver me from the body of this death?" In the Greek, the word that is translated body is not only referring to this physical body. If you study it in the Greek, it is speaking about a container. This body is the container which holds our what? What --

            [INAUDIBLE]

No, what --

            [INAUDIBLE]

No, no.

            [INAUDIBLE]

The soul. The body is the container which holds the soul. When the Scripture speaks about unregenerate men, men that do not have Christ being formed in them, and it talks about the body, it is speaking about this physical body. But as soon as Christ begins to be formed in you, I do not want to say never because I do not know every single word in the Scripture, but through all of my studies, every time the Scripture ever uses the word body with regard to someone in whom Christ is being formed, that word is describing the soul. Because as soon as that Christ mind drops into your spiritual being, the soul becomes the container of the mind of Christ.

So when Paul speaks about the body of this death, you may say he is speaking about this physical body, but he is really speaking about his carnal mind, the mind which gives death, this soul, which has brought forth a mind that is death, which is the container in which the mind of Christ is growing. And he is wretched, and he is tormented because he is in the process of being sanctified. And he is pulling -- two different parts of his spiritual being are pulling in opposite directions.

You see, this concept of the mind of the flesh, I would like to talk about that for a minute because you do not hear it very often. Even I have not brought it forth that often, as to exactly what the carnal mind is. And let me just re- -- well, we already mentioned it today, that a mind is a product of a union between a spirit, which is male, and a soul, which is female. The offspring is a mind. When the Spirit of the Father God joins with the spirit in the living soul, she produces a what? A boy or a girl, a son or a daughter? When the Father God joins with the spirit in the living soul, she gives birth to a son or a daughter?

            [?A son?].

To a son. God only produces male children. God does not have any daughters. The mind that is born when the father is God is always male. But what happened at the time of the fall was that one of the elements in the living soul -- the living soul has many elements to it. Just as we have a heart and a liver and a spleen, just as we have a conscious mind and a unconscious mind, the living soul, at the time of the fall, brought forth something from within itself that stole the role of male or stole the role of spirit and joined with herself, fertilized herself, and brought forth a mind in the living soul that was fathered by the soul itself. And that is the mind of the flesh. The word carnal means flesh. The mind of the flesh, the carnal mind, it is a mind that exists in the flesh of the living soul that sprang forth of itself. It was not fathered by a male. And the Scripture likens it to a weed that comes forth in your garden.

We have Scriptures in the Gospels where the servants say to the Lord, "Did you sow those seeds? Where did those tares come from? Who sowed those seeds?" And the Lord said, "An enemy sowed those seeds," the enemy being the very soul itself.

Verse 25, "I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh," or with the soul or with the emotions, "I serve the law of sin." And this split condition has produced a condition of wretchedness in the apostle Paul. I want to suggest to you that the church world in this hour has many, many more babies than it does adults, babies who dance and sing and wear dove pins and flutter around the church and give testimonies about how God is giving them all the money that they want and meeting all their needs. And I want to suggest to you that that is what God does with babies.

You know, there was a man in this fellowship once. He never went to a church like that. God brought him right into this fellowship, and he was very bitter. The man was a business man. He just could not get that business off the ground, and He earth was very bitter towards God because he came under judgment immediately after he came to the Lord. He came into this fellowship, and he came under judgment. Get your eyes off of the other people in the church. God is not doing the same thing with everybody in the church. Everybody is not the same age. You cannot tell how old a Christian is by their sex, by their physical age or for any other carnal reason.

And the more mature the believer, the more likely their wretchedness, the more likely their torment, the more likely their distress, the more likely their trouble, the more likely their hardship, the less likely God is to deliver them immediately from trials and tribulations. But to them, Paul says, "Endure hardship like a good soldier." There is no place that you could run from the judgments of God.

Well, all that to get to chapter 8, chapter 8 of the Book of Romans. "There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh," or the mind of the flesh which is carnal, "but after the Spirit," or the mind which is of the Spirit, which is Christ. "There is now therefore no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus." Well, what does that mean, to be in Christ Jesus? Those who walk or whose lifestyle does not follow after the mind of the flesh or is not ruled by the mind of the flesh but those whose lifestyle is ruled by the mind of the Spirit. Those are the ones who are in Christ Jesus. There is now no more condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, those who follow after or live out of the mind of Christ, not the mind which the flesh brought self -- brought forth of itself.

Now please note, brethren, that it is not enough to have the mind of Christ. You must walk in it. You must talk in it. You must live in it. You must think with it. You must use it, or it will dry up and fall off and die or die and fall off.

Alternate Translation -- well, let me give you this first. We just came out of a study in Romans 5, and we found the word condemnation in Romans 5. This is the same word, Strong's 2631, and it is speaking about the condemnatory sentence. God has condemned this soul, and the condemnation of God is also known as the wrath of God. The judgment that this soul has been put under is that we have been put in a spiritual jail down in a big hole. The name of the location of that hole is Hell. A taskmaster has been placed over us. His name is Satan. Satan has an image, and his name is the carnal mind, and we are joined to these two by chains of, anybody? Darkness. Where? In the mind.

And for those whose lifestyle is now out of the mind of Christ, we are in the process of being delivered out from under the tyranny of this world system and the powers and principalities which rule it. And who are the power and principalities? What a mysterious name, what mysterious words. Who are the powers and principalities? They were just named here. Satan, your unconscious mind, the carnal mind, your conscious mind and Eve, who is in an adulterous union with the two of them, your very own human spirit, even the false prophet that is mentioned in the Book of Revelation, in your own mind, who will swear that Satan is the Lord.

So this condemnation we read about in Romans 8:1 is that sentence which humanity is under which has been placed upon us by God. And the Greek word translated in -- translated after, "To those who walk after the flesh," we are going to translate it in, in the flesh or in the mind of the flesh, in the flesh. And this Greek word translated flesh is the soft substance of the living body which covers the bones and is permeated with blood. Now this I took out of Thayer's, but I want to suggest to you that the flesh is the soft substance underneath this skin. You know, the Greek and the Hebrew clearly separates between the bones and the flesh, which I believe this was a description of the flesh, and the skin that covers the flesh. So to say that the flesh is this body is really not accurate.

Let me read it to you again. The flesh is this body without the skin. We could say that. It is the soft substance of the living body which covers the bones and is permeated with blood. And I remember -- I remind you of a recent teaching about our spiritual being, OK, which is permeated with the life of Christ. Remember our example? That in this natural body, the blood flows through the arteries in the veins, but if you prick your skin in any place, you will see blood. Why? Because every tissue is saturated with blood. Even though the majority of the blood is flowing through your veins in your arteries, every tissue is saturated with blood. That is how this body exists. In our spiritual being, the blood is the Spirit of God, and every cell of our spiritual being saturated with His life.

So this flesh, I suggest to you, is the flesh underneath the skin, for the body, and as far as our soul is concerned, OK, we are talking about a soul. Now, remember, the mind -- maybe I did not make it clear. The mind is the spiritual life of the flesh. The mind would be likened to the major arteries and veins that carry the blood, OK. And that mind has joined with the flesh of the soul, so we could say that the flesh of our soul is saturated with the spiritual authority of whichever mind is ruling in us. Our soul is saturated in every cell with the mi- -- carnal mind, and that is why this soul is dead.

So, "There is now therefore no" -- the wrath of God is no longer upon those which are in Christ Jesus who walk not after the flesh of this body but who walk not after the soul whose mind -- who has produced the mind of the flesh. You see, let me try it again. "Therefore and there is now" -- the wrath of God is not upon those who are in Christ Jesus whose lifestyle is not following after a soul whose mind has been brought forth from within that soul without a male seed. Have I lost somebody? I lost you, huh? OK, let me try it again.

Do you remember a few minutes ago I told you that the carnal mind is a mind which has been brought forth by the living soul of itself, like a weed that came up from the ground? Did you understand that? OK. So those of us who are in the flesh, OK, you will see in the next verse, what it is really saying are those of us whose lifestyle proceeds forth out of that mind which was brought forth by the flesh. OK, to be in the flesh means to be living your life out of the mind which the fallen soul brought forth of itself. OK? OK. It is not clear in this verse, but it becomes clearer in the next verse. But that is -- if you look at it in the Greek and if you pray about it, that is what it is saying, OK.

Because every -- see, I used to think that it meant that we had a choice between living a mind of reas- -- a life out of the mind, which was reason, or out of the flesh, which was emotions. I used to think that, but it is deeper than that. Because if you do not -- you have to have a mind, and if you do not have Christ or if you are not living out of Christ, you still need a mind. So it is impossible -- let me say it to you this way. It is impossible to live your life just out of your soul. You have to have a mind. Let me say it again. It is impossible to live your life just out of your soul. You have to have a mind. So the question is, which is your mind? Is it the mind of Christ, or is it the counterfeit mind that the flesh has brought forth? Is it the mind of the flesh, or is the mind of Christ that you are following after? You cannot live without a mind. Are you OK? OK.

So the way it is phrased in the King James, and even in the Greek, at this point, it sounds like you are either living out of your mind or you are living out of your flesh, which is your soul. I am saying this again now. But that is not true because you cannot have an existence without a mind. So what is happening here is that Paul is not even acknowledging, at this point. He has not gotten up to the carnal mind yet. He is saying, are you living out the mind of Christ, or are you living out of your soul? OK, but those of us who are into mature doctrine, I am telling you a couple of verses in advance that you cannot live just out of your soul, that although Paul was not stating it, he meant are you living out of the mind that the soul brought forth of itself? OK, are you with me? Yeah, OK. And the Greek word translated walk means lifestyle, to live or conduct one's life.

Alternate Translation, Romans 8:1, "Therefore the wrath of God is no longer directed towards those in whom Christ Jesus is ruling, who conduct their lives according to the internalized law of the Spirit of Christ and not the spirit of Satan."

Amplified translation, Romans 8:1, "Therefore the destructive forces controlling this world system no longer have authority over those who reject Satan's influence and conduct their lives in submission to the Spirit of Christ because Christ Jesus is become the God in the midst of them."

You see, you cannot do it. You cannot reject the forces of this world system and conduct yourself in a manner pleasing to God without Christ being in the midst of you. Some people have a strong enough willpower to clean up their behavior and to clean up their words, but you cannot live out of your emotions in a lifestyle that will please God without Christ being formed in you. It is impossible.

Continuing with Romans 8:2. Just let me tell you how far we got today. We got through verse 8 today. Is everybody OK? We are still on the first message, are not we? Yeah, OK.

Romans 8:2, "For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death." We have already talked about the law being a controlling force. The word life here is speaking about the -- it is the Greek word zōḗ. We had it on a recent message. Let me give it to you again. This Greek word zōḗ is a simple word means life. For you to find out what kind of life the Scripture is speaking about, you have to read the whole verse. If the whole verse does not reveal to you what kind of life, you have to read the whole -- well, you start with the sentence. Then you go to the verse, and then you go to the chapter because the Greek word l- -- that is translated life has to be modified. There is all different kinds of life. There is the immature life of God. There is the mature life of God and all different stages.

So just the fact that this is the Greek word zōḗ, it means that we are talking about something of God because there is not -- there is life nowhere outside of God. You see, what we are experiencing now is not life. It is existence, but as far as God is concerned, it is not life. And as far as God is concerned and the Scripture, when we have babies, those babies are born dead. This is an existence which has a name, and the name of this existence is what? Death. And the place where this existence exists is Hell. So we must get out of this mentality that says death means the death of this body. No, death is a condition of existence.

So for Paul to be saying to us that the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made him free, it means that the beginning stages of life have entered in, and the Scripture describes that as a blade of grass coming up. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free or has set me at liberty from the law or the controlling force that causes me to sin and therefore experience death because I have sinned.

You may recall, also, from our study in Romans 5, that a sin is a misdeed. It is wandering from the path of uprightness and honor, and the Greek word translated death here is thanatos. And thanatos means much more than the death of the body. It is speaking largely about misery and suffering. Now if you look this word up in the Greek lexicons, it will tell you that this is the misery and suffering which exists after this body dies, but I suggest to you it is the ex- -- thanatos is the existence characterized by misery and suffering which humanity fell into when the mind of Christ, which was ruling righteous Adam, died. And we died in Him.

Brethren, if a human being dies, if a woman dies, every one of her ovarian eggs which has the potential to produce a child dies with her. We died in Adam's loins. And Adam lost his ability to produce young in the image of God, and we are told in Genesis 5, began to reproduce in the likeness and image of himself. The humanity today and the condition that we are in is a weed. We are an offspring that has been brought forth from within the living soul by its own ability, without a male seed. We are a perversion. We are a perversion. Not only are we bastards, but we are a perversion. We are an abomination. We are a product of incest and spiritual homosexuality, and that child must die, and the name of that child is the carnal mind. She must die, and she shall surely die. But the Lord has preserved us alive until such time as His manchild is ready to jump in and save our life at the exact moment that He kills the perverse child.

Alternate Translation, Romans 8:2, "Because the controlling force in Christ Jesus which produces life has set me free from the controlling force which causes me to do dishonorable misdeeds which bring the misery and suffering of this existence upon me."

"Because the controlling force in Christ Jesus which produces life has set me free from the controlling force which causes me to do dishonorable misdeeds which bring the misery and suffering of this existence upon me."

Continuing with Romans 8:3, "For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh." I do not know about you, but I never really could figure out what Paul was talking about. Let us try and find out what he is saying.

What the law could not do because the flesh was weak, speaking about the fall now, the law that was in the creation at the time that it fell, you may recall, was an immature Christ. Christ is a law. So what the law could not do because of the weakness in the flesh is not speaking about the glorified Christ because the glorified Christ can do anything. So the Scripture must be speaking about the law.

And that law, that immature Christ who, let me remind you, was formed by God but which had no -- what kind of experiences, anybody? Overcoming experiences. The Christ at the beginning of time, which we call the immature Christ, was a mind which had had no overcoming experiences. And because of that, it did not have the strength to overcome the weakness which was in the flesh. And what was the weakness in the flesh? This Greek word that is translated weak, it means impotent. What was the weakness in the flesh? The weakness of the flesh was the potential to sin. The weakness in the flesh was really lack of experience.

Brethren, I want to tell you, when you have experienced sin and you have experienced its destructive force in your life and God has delivered you out from that, from under that dominion of that sin, and you see the temptation coming towards you and you remember what happened to you when you fell into it before, it raises up a strength in you to fight with everything you have to not fall prey to it again. And we are told in the Book of Hebrews that to have experienced such a deliverance from God and when sin comes to tempt you again, to not fight it with all the strength that you have, there is something wrong with you. And what is wrong with you is that there is a curse operating in you that is preventing you from learning from your experience.

And God's ministry to you, who may have such a problem, is hardship, chastening, difficult times. Nobody likes to hear that. Someone recently said to me, "You are doing the wrong thing. You should be nice to me." No, I am doing the wrong thing. You do not know. I am doing the right thing. You do not know what you are talking about. The Bible clearly states that you take a rod to the child, and it will beat the foolishness out of them. I cannot find one Scripture that says you correct rebellion and pride and every other destructive work by being kind to somebody. Do you know a Scripture like that? Do you? I do not know any s- -- do you? I do not know any such Scripture. My Bible says break a rod across their back. Amen. Glory to God.

So what the immature Christ could not do, in that it was weak because of the inexperience in the flesh, God is sending His own Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, in the likeness of sinful flesh, wrapped in a fallen soul and fallen body, "and for sin," or for the benefit of sin, "condemned sin in the flesh." Well, what does that mean? Well, brethren, let me remind you that salvation is a man. His name is Christ Jesus. Salvation is a man. Sin is a man. His name is fallen Adam. Sin is a man. The soul man is called sin. So for the benefit of sin, for the benefit of the fallen human race, God came and condemned sin.

Now is that not a confusing thing? Why would you condemn someone that needs your help? Because, brethren, the help that we need is that rod across our back, and God, being a very legalistic, militaristic God, will not execute discipline until every step proving that we deserve it has been satisfied. And when Jesus Christ came and condemned this human race, why would He condemn us? He found us unrighteous. That was the condemnation that put into play the procedure which will execute correction, disciplinary correction, which will save us from this death or this experience of death.

Romans 5:6 says, "For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly." The Alternate Translation that we worked up on that is, "Because in the age of innocence, which is now passed, Christ died when He failed to distinguish between good and evil." That is the weakness. Lack of experience caused Him to fail to distinguish between good and evil. And we were cast down to this present evil age with Him and became ungodly.

We are in verse 3. The word send, "sending His own Son," that Greek word translated send means to thrust in. It can also mean to send again, but I am going to -- I have chosen to thrust in, and I want to suggest to you that God thrust in His spiritual Son into this fallen living soul, into this Hell of this world system. He thrust His Son into it. He forced Him int. He penetrated, militaristically penetrated this world system ruled by Satan. It was an act of war.

Alternate Translation, Romans 8:3, "Because God thrust His own Son into the fallen living soul to do what the law could not do, and condemned sin for its own good." Now this is a continuation from the prior verse. Several of these verses make up one sentence. Let me give you the whole thing. "Because the law of the Spirit of the life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death" -- I am sorry. I am reading the wrong one.

Verse 2, Alternate Translation, "Because the controlling force in Christ Jesus which produces life has set me free from the controlling force which causes me to do dishonorable misdeeds which bring the misery and the suffering of this existence upon me, and because God thrust His own Son into the fallen living soul to do what the law could not do and condemn sin for its own good," and then we are going to go onto the -- just try and bear with me. It does not sound like it flows properly now, but I straightened it out on the Alternate Translations at the end of the recap.

Verse 4, "That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit." And this Greek word translated righteousness, again, is speaking about the judicial decision which acquits a man. We had that in Romans 5.

Alternate Translation, the first half of Romans 8:4, "That we might be filled up with the one who pardons us from God's judgment upon humanity." Remember, we are lacking. We are not complete without Christ. We are complete in Him who is the head of all principality and power. And who is principality and power? Our carnal mind and Satan. We are completed in the one who is the authority over Satan.

Continuing with the second half of Romans 8:4, "Who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit." Walk, once again, is referring to lifestyle.

Alternate Translation, second half of Romans 8:4, "And he controlled, by the Spirit of Christ and not the spirit" -- I am sorry, "And be controlled by the Spirit of Christ and not the spirit of Satan." Romans 8:14 says, "For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God."

Alternate Translation, Romans 8:4, "That we might be filled up with the one who pardons us from God's judgment upon humanity and be controlled by the Spirit of Christ and not the spirit of Satan." And this is the description of a son of God, to be controlled by the Spirit of Christ and not by the spirit of Satan. Brethren, you are not a son of God if you are doing your own thing. God is a controlling force. He controls you. He sends you. He restrains you.

Something is coming to my mind to share with you. I cannot even remember the circumstance of it. I just know that I was -- someone called me. I had to go out. It was early in the morning, and I poured my coffee into a travel coffee cup, and I was ready to go shooting out the door. Someone was waiting for me. And I picked up that travel coffee cup and sat down and turned on the T.V. at 8 o'clock in the morning or 7:30 in the morning. I was watching the news. And as I was sitting there drinking this cup of coffee, I said to myself -- my mind was saying, "Why am I sitting in this chair when this person is waiting for me?" And my body could not get up off the couch, and I must have sat there for almost 45 minutes, the whole time my mind out of ag- -- it must have been my carnal mind, obviously, out of agreement with my body. But Christ controlled my body. It could not get up off of the couch.

Christ, which is a controlling force in my life, He has a lot of authority over me. As far as I am concerned, not enough. I will not be satisfied until He controls me completely. I could not get up off that couch. If you think that you are going to do your thing when Christ appears in you, you are mistaken.

I heard somebody say once, "When I stand up in full stature, first I am going to travel in the spirit to Puerto Rico, and then I am going to go here, and then I am going to go there." Sister, you are very mistaken. Paul said, "I wear this chain." Paul said, "I am in bonds unto the Lord Jesus Christ." The Spirit of Christ drove Paul to a place where he would be arrested, even though it was prophesied to him. It did not take him to the Riviera on vacation. And there is no discharge from this war.

Alternate Translation, Romans 8:4 -- oh, let me give you the -- I have an amplified translation, Romans 8:4, "That we might be filled up with Christ Jesus, the one who pardons us from the wrath of God, and be controlled by the Spirit of Christ instead of the spirit of Satan." Someone is controlling you, brethren. It is either Christ or Satan, and if you do not believe that, you are spiritually naïve and a scriptural fool.

Continuing with Romans 8:5, "For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit." Now I found that to be not a particularly good translation, "They that are after the flesh." So it goes back to what we talked about earlier, those who are living in their emotions, but it does not mean that. Let me just go right on. The interlinear says, "For according to the flesh, being the things of the flesh, mind those," which does not mean anything to you anyway.

As I read it in the interlinear, it is -- you see this phrase, "Mind the things of the flesh"? When you look at it in the interlinear, it is not saying mind or, like, pay attention to the things of the flesh. That is not what it is saying. It is talking about the flesh mind. Now that is a big difference, to say that you are minding or you are paying attention to someone else's business or to say that you are talking about a mind. That is a big difference. If you look at it in the Greek, this verse is speaking about the mind of the flesh. There is a mind in the flesh. It should not be there. It is a weed. It is illegal, but it is there. The mind of the flesh, that mind which is fleshly, that mind which is carnal, the carnal mind, the mind which has come forth of the flesh's own substance without the seed of the Father, an illegal, illegitimate, perverse offspring of God's wife.

Let me just give you the Alternate Translation of Romans 8:5. "Because those things which are in the soul are born of the flesh mind" -- what things are in the soul? All your demons, all your ungodly emotions. "Because those things which are in the soul are born of the flesh mind, but those things which are in the Spirit are born of the Spirit." Now I know it does not sound much like the King James, but I cannot receive this King James. "For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit." It sounds like they are paying -- those who are in the flesh are paying attention to the flesh and those who are in the Spirit are paying attention to the things of the Spirit. But the verse is much deeper than that.

Let me read it to you again. "Because those things which are in the soul" -- who -- what is in the soul? Satan is in the soul. The carnal mind is in the soul. Demons are in the soul. "Because those things which are in the soul are born of the flesh mind," and what is born of the flesh mind? Demons are born of the flesh mind. "But those things which are in the Spirit are born of the Spirit." And what is in the Spirit? The fruits of the Spirit. So demons are born of the carnal mind, and the fruit of the Spirit is born of the mind of God. That is what it is saying.

What it is saying is you have a soul, which the Scripture describes as a garden which is capable of producing fruit. And it is capable of receiving seed. When your soul receives the seed of the Father, the fruit is the goodness of God. But when it receives its own seed, it brings forth perversion, weeds in your garden.

I have two witnesses to that for you. John 3:6, "That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit." Galatians 4:29, "But as then he that was born after the flesh persecuted him that was born after the Spirit, even so it is now." So we see, in John 3:6, "That which is born of the flesh." What is born of the flesh? The carnal mind is still flesh.

Hear that, Satan? Even though -- I am talking to Satan in every one of you. Even though you have brought forth a mind in this creation, that mind is still flesh. You desire to be spirit. You want to be male. You have acted like a male. You have done the work of a male. You have brought forth an offspring, but the offspring is still female, and so are you. You are just a perversion because that which is born of the flesh is still flesh. And that is why the carnal mind is too weak to rule your passions. Unless you have discipline built into you and a strong program of morals and ethics, that man will be ruled and destroyed by his own soul.

And in Galatians 4:29, I think he was speaking about Esau if I am not mistaken. Can someone check that for me, please, Galatians 4:29? So we see in John 3:6 that we are speaking about minds being flesh or spirit, and in Galatians 4:29, we see the Scripture speaking about men either being spiritual or carnal, depending on the mind that is in them. Has someone found Galatians 4:29 for me? Jesus. Glory to God

            "But we now, brethren, as Isaac was, are the children of promise."

What is that, 28?

            Oh, that was 28, OK. We want 29, right? 

Well, what did you just read?

            28.

OK, so it is talking about Isaac?

            Yes.

And who else?

            That is all it says there, "are the children of promise."

OK. This is speaking about Abraham and his two children, Isaac and Ishmael, and Ishmael is the one of the flesh, and Isaac is the one of the spirit. So we see in John 3:6 that flesh and spirit can refer to minds alone, and in Galatians 4:29, we see that flesh can be referring to men who either have a mind of flesh or the mind of the spirit. So the man is either a flesh man or a spiritual man depending on the mind which is in him.

Colossians 1:20 says, "And, having made peace" -- why am I doing this? Did I put this in the wrong place? Let me read it to you. Colossians 1:20, "And, having made peace through the blood of His cross" -- OK, I know what I did. "By him to reconcile all things unto himself; by him, I say, whether they be in earth or things in heaven." So I put in this reference to show you that God -- when God refers to all things, because in Romans 8, He is talking about things, that God is speaking about minds. I do not think I made that clear to you. Let me try it again.

In Romans 8 -- OK, starting with verse 5 of Romans 8, the Scripture speaks about the things of the flesh and the things of the Spirit. So I read you Colossians 1:20 as an example of what the Lord is speaking about when He thinks -- when He speaks about things, and my point is that these things that He is speaking about is the mind. So at the very end of Colossians 1:20, we see the Scripture saying, "Whether these things be in earth," the mind of the flesh, "or whether these things be in heaven," the mind of Christ." That is my whole point, just one more witness that these things that are in the flesh and in the Spirit i- -- are minds. That is what Paul is talking about, the minds. That is in there. Is -- what is in the spirit? It is a mind. What is in the flesh? It is a mind. That is his whole point, and more specifically the minds that are within people.

Continuing with Romans 8:6, "For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace."

Let me just give you my Alternate Translation, and we will talk about it. "Because the mind which is born of the flesh kills the soul, but the mind which is born of the spirit gives it life and peace." Is that not much more powerful? Let me read it to you again.

The King James says, "For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace." And I say, "Because that mind which is born of the flesh kills the soul, but the mind which is born of the spirit gives it life and peace." That is a big difference. Is that not a big difference. That is a big difference, is it not? It makes a big difference to me. Because that mind which is born of the flesh," that means the mind whose father is the flesh, "kills the soul, but the mind which is born of the spirit gives it life and peace."

John 14:6 says, "Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life," so the life and peace that being born of the spirit gives us is Christ. Jesus said, "I am life." Everybody OK? Hebrews 13:20 says, "Now the God of peace, that brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great shepherd of the sheep" -- "Now that God of peace, that brought again the dead -- from the dead our Lord Jesus," so the God of peace, I suggest to you, is the Father, the Spirit of Christ that raised Jesus from the dead. The God of peace is the Spirit of Christ.

How does God make peace, somebody? Does He offer you a candy bar? Does He make you happy? How does God make peace? He --

            [?He?] [INAUDIBLE]

He beats you into submission, brethren. You know, for years, I read that Scripture that says, "And God pleaded with them," with Israel, "with blood and pestilence." I read that Scripture for years. I said, how do you plead with blood and pestilence? I do not understand this. Let me tell you something, brethren. There is a darkness that is upon the mind of man. It is outside of him, and it is inside of him. It is a spiritual ignorance, and it has a name, and it is death, and you cannot reason with it. You cannot negotiate with it. So God pleads with us with blood and pestilence. He draws blood, brethren, and He sends pestilence against us until we come into agreement with His mind, and then we have peace. God does not negotiate with fallen minds. He is immovable in His righteousness.

Continuing with Romans 8:7, "Because the carnal mind is enmity against God:  for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be." You see, the carnal mind will never submit to God, will never understand God, will never work with God, will never compromise with God. So therefore it must be killed. Real simple.

Problems go one of two ways in God’s kingdom:  Either He rehabilitates you or He kills you. You cannot be messing up society. You cannot be coming in and messing up people’s lives and wrecking what God is doing for people. Either He beats you into submission or He kills you. And if you think I do not know what I am talking about, you are mistaken because I know what I am talking about.

God does not kill anybody. Brethren, people die every day in this world. People die every minute, and they die every second. And what is more, believers die all the time. And it is getting to be a common thing in these local churches that are all lifted up in pride and think they have the power to heal anybody they choose to heal. And people are dying in these congregations. And the people are wounded and devastated because they have been taught incorrectly. We cannot heal anyone we choose to heal. We can heal people that God chooses to heal. And in this hour, God is letting some people that call themselves Christians die. And that is the truth.

I had several people -- in particular one woman; I have her in mind right now. She was devastatedly [sic] upset with me. In the hour of my severe trial, before I went into the hospital three years ago, I told her that God might let me die. Here I was, half dead, could barely sit up in the chair that was -- that I was sitting in when I was talking to her. And she is [?lacing?] me out, telling me I have no faith. And I said, sister, do not be a fool. If He lets me die, I will die, and if He raises me up, I will live. And do not tell me that I have no faith. And you want to know what her motive was? Do you want to know what the bottom-line was? And she admitted it. If what I said was true, that means she was no longer guaranteed a healing should she get sick. And she was overtaken with fear.

I want to tell you we do not have the power to heal anybody of anything unless we are doing the work of God. If He wants them healed, we heal. If He wants them delivered, we deliver. If He wants them to die, we find ourselves powerless. We are expressions of almighty God. We do not decide who lives and who dies.

“Because the carnal mind is enmity against God:  for it is not subject to the law of God” -- or the controlling force of God -- “neither indeed can be.” Therefore it must die. You see, so long as the carnal mind is alive, this wild, raging beast is going to be doing everything it can to kill Christ in you. If you have a mature Christ in you and He has put your carnal mind underfoot, that thing is locked up in the bottomless pit. He is not going to stop trying to get out. He is not going to stop trying to escape. He is not going to stop trying to kill you.

And, you know, it requires energy to keep someone under your feet. Once you get them to -- if you are a wrestler, once you get the other guy down on the mat -- it is easier to keep his shoulders pinned once you get him down than it is to try and get him down. But it still takes an effort; it still drains your energy to keep his shoulders pinned to the mat. We do not enter into complete rest until that thing dies although things will get much better when we pin his shoulders to the mat.

The Greek word translated enmity can be translated hatred. The words, can be, mean to have the power to be. And the word translated because really means therefore.

Alternate Translation, Romans 8:7, “Therefore the mind which is born of the flesh hates God because it is not, nor can it be” -- I am sorry. I -- this is wrong here. Let me just get a pen. “Because it does not submit itself nor can it submit itself to God’s control.”

The carnal mind could not submit to God’s control if it wanted to. The carnal mind is a wild, raging beast, which is incapable of submission to God. Therefore it must be chained up and killed.

It is like saying -- well, when man went into the jungles -- there are not many jungles left anywhere in the world, very few jungles left. When man first went into the jungles, it would be like looking at a lion or a leopard or a tiger and saying, now leopard, I am man, and I am superior to you, so submit yourself to me, or I will have to kill you. And what do you think the leopard did? He tried to eat the jerk that was saying that.

That is what the carnal mind is. He will not submit to Christ nor is he able to do it, just as the lion could not submit to the hunter. He cannot understand. He cannot submit. All he could do is roar and try to bite you, so brute force must be used. You have to use a weapon against him. You have to put nets on him. You have to chain him up. You have to put a muzzle on his mouth. You have to defeat him with spiritual authority. He will never submit to you. He will never negotiate with you. He will never reason with you. He will never appreciate any concession you make unto him. So you must bring him under the authority of Christ.

“Therefore the mind which is born of the flesh hates God because it is not -- because it cannot submit nor is it capable of submitting to God’s control.”

Continuing with Romans 8:8, “So then they that are born of the flesh cannot please God.” So after everything we have just read about in Romans 8:1-7 lead us to the conclusion that men with minds born of the flesh cannot please God. So then men whose minds are born of the flesh cannot please God. It is impossible. If your behavior is perfect, if you never sin with your mouth or your body, you still cannot please God. There is only One who will please God, and that is the very Savior Himself appearing as your mind. God will take nothing less.

Recap, Romans 8:1-8 -- and I tried to -- I added a couple of ands in there, and I tried to run it together so you could see that it is really one sentence here.

“Therefore the wrath of God is no longer directed towards those in whom Christ Jesus is ruling, who conduct their lives according to the internalized law of the Spirit of Christ and not the spirit of Satan.

“Therefore the controlling force in Christ Jesus, which produces life, has set me free from the controlling force which causes me to do dishonorable misdeeds, which bring the misery and suffering of this existence upon me.

“And because God thrust His own Son into the fallen living soul to do what the law could not do and condemn sin for its own good:

“That we might be filled up with Christ Jesus, the One who pardons us from the wrath of God and be controlled by the Spirit of Christ instead of the spirit of Satan.

“And because those things which are in the soul are born of the flesh mind, but those things which are in the Spirit are born of the Spirit,

“And because the mind which is born of the flesh kills the soul, but the mind which is born of the Spirit gives it life and peace” -- after all these and becauses [sic] --

“Therefore the mind which is born of the flesh hates God because it is not, nor can it ever submit itself to God’s control.

“So then therefore, men with minds born of the flesh cannot please God.”

So Paul went through this whole rigmarole explaining to us about the two potential minds that we could have:  the mind that comes from God and the mind that the flesh brings forth of itself. He very clearly goes into details to explain to us that there is nothing that the mind which is born of the flesh can do that will please God. God will not accept the mind born of the flesh as demonstrated in the account of Cain and Abel. There was nothing that Cain, the m- -- the flesh mind -- Cain typifying the flesh mind -- could have given to God that would have been acceptable to Him.

And today man is still trying to give God sacrifices brought forth from his own mind or from the flesh itself. God will not receive it. He will not receive your works. He will not receive your carnal prayers. He will not receive your carnal sacrifices. Well, let me modify that. He will receive them for a season when you are a baby. He will laugh at you. He will tickle you. He will go, goo, goo. But when you grow up, He will not receive your works. He will receive nothing except the birth of the mind of God in you. Any questions?

And by the way, when that mind is born in you, it will begin to wage war against the mind of the flesh, which is in you. And you will have trouble in your life the like of which you have never experienced. The Bible calls it Jacob’s trouble. [AUDIO CUTS OUT] It is a labor that will bring forth a fully mature mind of Christ in you. There is no place in this world you can run to escape it. Did you have a question? [AUDIO CUTS OUT]

So that our striving or our working toward overcoming the carnal mind is by producing the mind of Christ? That is --

Yes.

            -- the only --

All of our efforts --

            -- that is the only --

Yes.

            -- way -- 

Every --

            -- right? 

Every effort, every human effort we make, should be directed towards doing the things that will produce the mind of Christ in us. That does not include giving out tracts.

            And there is no way we can crush the carnal mind then?

Not in -- no, Christ in you must do it. You must do it with the weapon -- you must do it, but you cannot do it without a weapon. And your weapon is Christ. The carnal mind is a weapon. He is a military machine. He is powerful, and you have no strength against him without another spiritual weapon. And the spiritual weapon which will destroy your carnal mind is Christ, and there is none other.

            So what we have to do is ask Christ to crush the carnal mind then?

Well, no --

            Is that correct?

I -- maybe I do not understand you. No, you have to confess your sins and repent. You have to ask God to show -- to expose your sins. And you have to ask Him to get you out from denial and strip the blinders off of your eyes so that you can see your sin and genuinely repent. That is what you have to do. You have to confess your sins and repent. That is your work; that is what you have to do.

It is not that you are not going to do it, so Christ is going to do it for you, no. You have to do it by the power of Christ. And your carnal mind does -- this crushing of your carnal mind, it is not an abstract thing, oh, I am going to crush my carnal mind. That is the same thing [UNINTELLIGIBLE]

I repent of this; I repent of that. I want deliverance. I repent of this; I repent of that. And then something happened. I said to him, brother, do you know what you just said? OK, that was what you just repented of operating in your behavior. He could not believe it. It is very easy to sit there and say, I repent of pride. But can you repent of what you just said that that was pride? Can you confess that what you just thought, that that was pride? You cannot just say, I crush my carnal mind. It has to come out a personality characteristic at a time. It is just not that simple.

Do you know what I am talking about? You cannot just say, I crush my carnal mind. You pray a prayer, crush my carnal mind, the next thing that happens to you is that God is exposing sin in the way you think and in the things you say and in the things you do. That is your work:  to confess it as sin when He shows it to you. And that is, in fact, the crushing of your carnal mind that you are doing, but you cannot do it without His strength.

OK, that answer your question? Anybody else?

Early on in the message, you were talking about the tears that were sowed. Are you saying that the tears were the carnal mind that Satan -- ?

Yes, the tears --

            Yeah. 

-- are the carnal minds of men, yes.

            So then in other words, they were told to leave them there?

Mm-hmm.

Let them both grow together. So in other words, the mind of Christ and the carnal mind growing?

Mm-hmm.

            Is that what that is meaning?

Yes. They are growing --

            Wow.

-- together, yes.

            I did not realize that that was --

Yes, they are growing together.

So in the end -- and it says, leave them to the end. So in other words, as God has His few, they will be crushing -- through the power of God, crushing their carnal mind. Then they will be used for others when it says to gather them in the end. So in other words, they are going to be crushing all the carnal minds.

Everybody has to crush their own carnal mind. The only thing somebody outside of you could do is help you to get started --

            Yeah. 

-- is to lend their --

            OK.

-- strength to you until Christ in you is strong enough to do it, but you have got to kill your own carnal mind. Let every man bring his sacrifice before the Lord. Got to do your own carnal mind.

02/19/15 Transcribed by VerbalFusion

02/20/15 1^st Edit CAS/BP